Jimmu's blog

A dollar of prevention is worth $5.60 in cure

By Sarah E. White for CalorieLab Calorie Counter News

If $10 were invested for every American each year into proven health programs, we could save up to $16 billion in health costs annually within five years, making the payoff for each dollar spent $5.60.

That’s according to a report from the Trust for America’s Health, which reports that Medicare would see $5 billion in savings, while private insurers would save more than $9 billion and Medicaid almost $2 billion.

How to use the money

The report says that the money could be used for non-medical interventions, such as:

• Building sidewalks and parks
• Making affordable, healthy food more available
• Helping people to quit smoking or raising tobacco taxes

The report says that many programs are effective at helping people lose weight or preventing chronic diseases even when less than $10 per person is spent.

Where the savings come from

The report says that communities that implemented changes would see a 5 percent reduction in diabetes cases and high blood pressure within two years, a 5 percent drop in heart disease, kidney disease and stroke within five years, and a 2.5 percent reduction in some forms of cancer, as well as arthritis and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, over 10 to 20 years.

These reductions in health problems would decrease health costs across the board, the report says, but the return on investment would be greater in some states and regions than others.

For example, the report suggests the return on investment for such a program in Washington, D.C., would be 9.9 to 1, or almost $10 in savings for every dollar spent. Utah would see a benefit of only 3.7 to 1, according to the report.

Clearly these numbers are not related to a decrease in obesity levels, since Colorado, the leanest state, would see a 5 to 1 return on investment, while Mississippi, the fattest state, increases its ROI only to 5.2 to 1.

Still, this kind of investment is worth making no matter the level of return, says Jeff Levi, executive director of the trust.

“This study shows that with a strategic investment in effective, evidence-based disease prevention programs, we could see tremendous returns in less than five years — sparing millions of people from serious diseases and saving billions of dollars,” he said in a press release.