It looks like Obamacare does not address obesity issues as they are incredibly expensive. There are a lot of concerns regarding the increase in health costs under the Affordable Care Act. Obama promised that the act would be helpful to Americans and that it will cut the expenses and produce a healthier overall population.
The Obama administration said that they will make this possible through numerous measures, such as the Prevention and Public Health Fund, which granted initially a sum of $15 billion in order to invest in public health and prevention programs proven to be helpful in keeping Americans healthy, from combating obesity to smoking cessation.
The original idea seemed to be rather simple. If people in America who were not insured were granted access to primary care doctors, they would have been able to make healthy changes in their lifestyles and ultimately reducing the general health insurance for all the people.
However, now there is a fact that simply cannot be denied: a major problem in the United States is obesity and it brings considerably increased health care costs. According to an article in Forbes written by Todd Hixon, conditions and diseases as results of obesity amount to a sum of $732 billion, or 24 percent of all the health care expenditures in the United States. By reducing these expenses, Americans could all benefit from the savings.
Having said that, according to available information, the Affordable Care Act has not significantly changed how a lot of people, particularly those below the middle class, get health care. And as a result of this, health care costs continue to increase.
The New York Times recognizes the minor progress made in the fight with obesity is not because of the recent actions taken by the government. The reversion seems to take place because of the growing realization of people that they were damaging their health by drinking and eating way too much. This awareness started to come into place from the late ‘90s, as a result of scientific studies about the obesity cost, and thanks to public health campaigns.
But even with the advancements in the daily consumption, the information in the Journal of the American Medical Association reveal there hasn’t been any significant change in the prevalence of obesity ever since 2003-2004 and showed no change at all from 2009 to 2010 and 2011 to 2012.
Approximately nine million individuals became insured thanks to Obamacare in 2014.
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