Oct 09 2008
The Cost of Chronic Illness
I have been receiving emails from someone who works for the Partnership to Fight Chronic Disease and they sent me an interesting article the other day. According to this article, New Take On Chronic Disease, $2.4 trillion is expected to be spent this year on 3/4 of all healthcare costs. Isn’t that figure astounding?
The article also states that chronic diseases top the list of reasons for death and disability in the United States. What is even sadder yet is that most of the healthcare dollars are spent on management instead of prevention.
What is this world going to be like in 20 years? If the incidences of chronic illness continue to rise, there won’t be anyone left to work. The Partnership to Fight Chronic Disease also shares that approximately 80% of heart attacks, strokes and diabetes can be prevented.
This is my own personal opinion, but I feel that as a society we have become too lazy and have not managed our own health and lives appropriately. I’m guilty, too. We tend to not have enough time to take care of ourselves and the numbers of chronic illness cases and deaths will continue to rise until we take enough time out to exercise, eat properly and learn how to relax.
