Can you truly be healthy? Will you ever be able to lose weight and keep
it off? The percentage of Americans that are now considered overweight or obese
continues to rise, in some areas of the country passing 60%, but, at the same
time, some reports suggest that diets fail at a 95% to 98% rate. You might
think, “So what! Yeah, I could stand to lose a few pounds, but what’s the big
deal?” Better questions to ask are: Can you afford to be fat? Can you afford to
be unhealthy?
A recent study from George Washington University
added up the cost of being overweight and obese and found, “The individual cost
of being obese is $4,879 a year for women and $2,626 for men.” They defined
obese as anyone with a BMI of 30 or higher. But wait, there’s more … they also
found that obese workers had a 76% increase in risk for short-term disability,
as well as a decreased life expectancy of five years in men and four years in women.
But there’s even more …
A study from Ohio State University found that
every one-unit increase in a young person’s BMI (starting at 30) was associated
with an 8% reduction in net worth. As if those numbers are not scary enough,
consider this: The increasing percentages of people who are overweight and
obese are causing other statistics to change. From 2007 to 2012, there has been
a 41% increase in costs associated with diabetes. If you are overweight and
either have type 2 diabetes or are on the road to being diagnosed with it, add
these costs to your number: The average medical costs for people diagnosed with
diabetes is $13,700 per year in the U.S. Indirect costs of having type 2
diabetes include:
·
increased absenteeism ($5 billion per year),
·
reduced productivity of working adults ($20.8
billion per year),
·
inability to work as a result of the disease
($21.6 billion), and
·
lost productive capacity due to early mortality
($18.5 billion)
Now, let’s consider another disease with a direct
link to being overweight or obese, heart disease:
·
1 in 4 deaths in the United States are due to
heart disease.
·
1 in 3 adults (80 million) in the United States
have some form of heart disease, stroke, or other blood vessel diseases.
·
The number of heart attacks and strokes that
occur in the United States is 1.5 million a year.
·
Heart disease and stroke cost the nation $312.6
billion a year in health care costs and lost economic productivity.
·
At the current rate of growth heart disease will
triple in the next 20 years.
As you can see, the economic impact of being
overweight or obese is substantial, yet we are faced with the stark reality
that 95% of diets fail. So is there really a sustainable solution to this
problem?
We are immersed in the information age, with
unprecedented access to information, yet we are failing at an extremely high
rate. There are a variety of opinions about how to lose weight and get healthy,
everything from “the law of positive attraction,” to “prayer,” to reading books
or attending seminars with “experts.” Is the secret to success and having what
you want really as simple as sending out a prayer or creating a desire for
something you want so that it will find you? Most “experts” tell us that the
key is to write goals, not just any goal but a SMART goal (Specific,
Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-based). Most New Year's Resolutions
are perfect SMART goals ... “I will lose 30 lbs. by June.” Is that goal
specific? Yes. Is it measurable? Yes, you just have to step on the scale. Is it
achievable? Absolutely! Is it relevant? It is if you have more than 30 lbs. to
lose. Is it time-based? Yep.. But does it work? Only 2% to 5% of the time. What
if, suddenly, the priority changed, and it was no longer something you wanted
to do to look better but something that a loved one needed to do?
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