Diabetes Epidemic Threatens Health Care System
Cardiovascular disease, strokes, and peripheral vascular disease are all very expensive conditions to treat in our technologically sophisticated health care system.
These conditions already occupy some of the top slots when it comes to where our health care dollar are spent.
So imagine what is going to happen now that the rates of diabetes have doubled (with no end in sight).
So, this epidemic of diabetes and pre-diabetes is not just a health care issue that burdens individuals and their families living with the disease.
It is a looming societal problem that threatens to bankrupt our already fragile health care system.
It could cause health care insurance premiums to escalate even further, impacting not only employers who provide coverage, but also public payors, like Medicaid and Medicare.
An article published in the New York Times January 31, 2007 by Richard Pérez-Peña declares, "One in Eight Adults in the City Has Diabetes, a Study Finds".
That is 12.
5% of the population or 700,000 people.
Lest you feel relieved that you don't live there, let me remind you that the rest of the country is not all that far behind.
Overall, about 10.
3% of Americans have diabetes and about a quarter of them don't know it (yet).
An additional 24% of adults in NY (and in the rest of the country) have abnormally high blood sugars that have not yet reached diabetic levels.
This condition is known as pre-diabetes.
Not too many years ago, the diabetes rate was 6%.
But our self-indulgent ways have caught up with us.
Too little exercise, too many calories plus too much stress adds up to an epidemic of obesity, particularly abdominal obesity.
Abdominal obesity, especially visceral obesity, is linked to the development of Type 2 diabetes in genetically predisposed individuals.
It's just a "touch of sugar.
" Why all the concern? Because diabetes and it precursor, pre-diabetes, are the most familiar manifestations of a constellation of metabolic changes, known as cardiometabolic syndrome.
Other manifestations of this syndrome are high blood pressure, dyslipidemia ((high triglycerides) and low HDL ("good") cholesterol)), clotting abnormalities, and problems with inflammation.
People with cardiometabolic syndrome, even if they haven't yet developed full-blown diabetes, have an increased risk of heart attacks and strokes.
It is time to get deadly serious about doing something about prevention.
We need to rapidly move to institutionalize regular exercise programs in school and at work.
And we need affordable, easily accessible healthy eating options.
That means we must be willing to regulate, legislate, and maybe even implement taxes (oh, oh, the tax word!) that can get us to where we need to be.
Failure to do something now will almost certainly result in huge adverse financial consequences that will ripple through society in the not too distant future.
These conditions already occupy some of the top slots when it comes to where our health care dollar are spent.
So imagine what is going to happen now that the rates of diabetes have doubled (with no end in sight).
So, this epidemic of diabetes and pre-diabetes is not just a health care issue that burdens individuals and their families living with the disease.
It is a looming societal problem that threatens to bankrupt our already fragile health care system.
It could cause health care insurance premiums to escalate even further, impacting not only employers who provide coverage, but also public payors, like Medicaid and Medicare.
An article published in the New York Times January 31, 2007 by Richard Pérez-Peña declares, "One in Eight Adults in the City Has Diabetes, a Study Finds".
That is 12.
5% of the population or 700,000 people.
Lest you feel relieved that you don't live there, let me remind you that the rest of the country is not all that far behind.
Overall, about 10.
3% of Americans have diabetes and about a quarter of them don't know it (yet).
An additional 24% of adults in NY (and in the rest of the country) have abnormally high blood sugars that have not yet reached diabetic levels.
This condition is known as pre-diabetes.
Not too many years ago, the diabetes rate was 6%.
But our self-indulgent ways have caught up with us.
Too little exercise, too many calories plus too much stress adds up to an epidemic of obesity, particularly abdominal obesity.
Abdominal obesity, especially visceral obesity, is linked to the development of Type 2 diabetes in genetically predisposed individuals.
It's just a "touch of sugar.
" Why all the concern? Because diabetes and it precursor, pre-diabetes, are the most familiar manifestations of a constellation of metabolic changes, known as cardiometabolic syndrome.
Other manifestations of this syndrome are high blood pressure, dyslipidemia ((high triglycerides) and low HDL ("good") cholesterol)), clotting abnormalities, and problems with inflammation.
People with cardiometabolic syndrome, even if they haven't yet developed full-blown diabetes, have an increased risk of heart attacks and strokes.
It is time to get deadly serious about doing something about prevention.
We need to rapidly move to institutionalize regular exercise programs in school and at work.
And we need affordable, easily accessible healthy eating options.
That means we must be willing to regulate, legislate, and maybe even implement taxes (oh, oh, the tax word!) that can get us to where we need to be.
Failure to do something now will almost certainly result in huge adverse financial consequences that will ripple through society in the not too distant future.
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