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Essay on Obesity and the Economy
Introduction
There have been numerous estimates of the economic costs of overweight and obesity. Among the most frequently cited are the direct and indirect health care costs calculated by Wolf and Colditz and published in Obesity Research in 2000. The researchers based their estimates on weighted data from the 1988 and 1999 National Health Interview Surveys, inflating the results to reflect 1999 dollars. These estimates were those utilized by the National Institutes of Health at the time this report was undertaken.
To estimate health care costs attributable to obesity, Wolf and Colditz used a prevalence-based approach including the obesity-related diseases of type 2 diabetes, coronary heart disease, hypertension, gallbladder disease, colon, breast, and endometrial cancers, and osteoarthritis. The total costs of each of these diseases to the economy were divided among direct medical costs (i.e., preventive, diagnostic, and treatment services such as personal health care, physician visits, hospital care, medications, nursing home care, and the like) and indirect health care costs (i.e., costs resulting from a reduction or cessation of productivity due to disease such as lost wages, lost future earnings, etc.).
The total cost of overweight and obesity to the U.S. economy in 1995 dollars was $99.2 billion, approximately $51.6 billion in direct costs and $47.6 billion in indirect costs. By disease, the authors estimated the following breakdowns:
- Type 2 diabetes: $63.1 billion
direct cost: $32.4 billion
indirect cost: $30.7 billion
- coronary heart disease: $7.0 billion (direct cost)
- colon cancer: $2.8 billion
direct cost: $1 billion
indirect cost: $1.8 billion
- post-menopausal breast cancer: $2.3 billion
direct cost: $840 million
indirect cost: $1.5 billion
- endometrial cancer: $790 million
direct cost: $286 million
indirect cost: $504 million
- hypertension: $3.2 billion (direct cost)
- osteoarthritis: $17.2 billion
direct cost: $4.3 billion
indirect cost: $12.9 billion...
