In addition to the many health consequences, obesity has significant health care costs. According to Barbara Wexler, author of ‘Weight in America: Obesity, Eating Disorders, and Other Health Risks’, “an obese person incurs about 42% more costs than a healthy-weight person, which translates into $1,429 more (per obese person) per year for medical care” (qtd. in Wexler). Certainly this demonstrates how obesity is straining our health care system. The cost of obesity related health care is mostly noticed in increased insurance premiums and added medical charges. Marion Nestle, New York University Professor of Nutrition and Public Health, notes that …show more content…
It also incurs costs to society that must be paid by the population at large, through higher health insurance and health care costs" (qtd. in Kiener). Although health care rates would have risen over the years naturally, obesity has pushed the rates upwards at an exceedingly fast pace. As stated by Robert Kiener, author of The Food Policy Debates, "... the direct medical costs of treating obesity alone are estimated to be $150 billion - $210 billion annually, costs that boost everyone's insurance premiums as well as taxes to pay for ever-increasing Medicare and Medicaid bills." (qtd. in Kiener). The medical costs that are attributed to obesity are almost entirely a result of the diseases that obesity promotes and their treatments. From this it can be concluded that