Guest post: The Affordable Care Act’s Prevention and Public Health Fund
Guest post by Michael Cahill
The Affordable Care Act’s Prevention and Public Health Fund: Why it needs to succeed for America’s Economic Future
What will it take for the Affordable Care, known more commonly as Obamacare, to succeed? Realistically speaking it will take a lot of things for the ACA to be a real success, but one vital area will be managing America’s chronic health problem. This is where Prevention and Public Health Fund comes it. Never heard of it before? Well let’s start with a little background.
The fund was established when the Care Act was signed into law back in 2010. It’s mission is to fund projects aimed at improving American public health. For example outreach programs about healthy food options, walking and biking infrastructure projects, or increasing access to blood pressure screenings at the dentist’s office.
One way that dentists can contribute to the Prevention and Public Health Fund’s mission is by providing preventive care services to their patients. Regular dental check-ups not only help prevent tooth decay and gum disease, but they can also detect early signs of systemic health problems like diabetes and heart disease. By increasing access to dental care and encouraging patients to prioritize their oral health, dentist Rego Park Queens can play a vital role in improving overall public health outcomes and reducing healthcare costs in the long run.
Before the sequester the fund was supposed to invest $15 billion during its first 10 years. But Republican lawmakers have slashed its budget by 40 percent since last year. Now the fund is also being victimized by the Department of Health and Human Services who announced plans in April to withdraw $454 million from the fund.
That money for the HHS will pay for outreach efforts concerning the federal health insurance exchanges being established in the majority of states. The move to withdraw the money from the fund was in response to Republicans repeating blocking funding requests from the HHS. When the news of the withdrawal by the HHS was announced the balance of the fund stood at $949 million.
So getting back to the mission of the fund, it’s probably no news to you that we Americans have a health problem. Specifically in the realm of preventable chronic diseases. Rates of heart disease and other obesity related illnesses are on the rise, and will cost the country dearly if they’re not dealt with.
The United States spends $2.7 trillion every year on healthcare, which is the highest in the world. That’s nearly 17 percent GDP. Compared to the country with next highest spending, Switzerland, which spends less than 12 percent of their GDP on healthcare.
Of that $2.7 trillion, 70 percent is spent on treating chronic disease, while only 3 percent goes towards disease prevention. Let that sink in, 70 percent of $2.7 trillion, that’s $1.8 trillion dollars. All that money goes toward treating chronic health issues, many of which could have been prevented through better lifestyle choices.
That $2.7 trillion is expected to keep going up and up. The HHS estimates that by 2017 health care spending will be almost 20 percent of United States GDP.
So what’s the solution here? Well if the Affordable Care Act aims to provide near universal health insurance to Americans something needs to be done about our chronic disease problem. It’s not hard to imagine it getting so out of control expensive that it crashes the system.
Which is where the Prevention Fund comes in. Without getting at the heart of the problem and helping people make healthier choices, which prevent these diseases from happening in the first place, the problem will get worse and worse.
So far the Prevention fund has already paid out $290 million to local governments, but the outlook is not good if lawmakers keep dipping into the fund and slashing its budget.
Of course the Prevention Fund is not the one stop solution to America’s health problems. It will still take individuals making the right decisions when it comes to their health. But it’s a start, and essential to the success of the Affordable Care Act in the long term.
(Michael Cahill is Editor of the Vista Health Solutions blog. He has a degree in Journalism from SUNY New Paltz and previously worked as a reporter for the Poughkeepsie Journal and an editor for the Rockland County Times. Follow him on Twitter at @VistaHealth and @ElectronicMike)
While I am not in agreement entirely, Michaels offers a take on a part of the program that is interesting and reasoned.
“So what’s the solution here? Well if the Affordable Care Act aims to provide near universal health insurance to Americans something needs to be done about our chronic disease problem. It’s not hard to imagine it getting so out of control expensive that it crashes the system.”
I answered this earlier in another post.
“Jan Perry, a Los Angeles city-council member, is spearheading legislation that would ban new fast-food restaurants like McDonald’s and KFC from opening in a 32-square-mile chunk of the city, including her district. The targeted area is already home to some 400 fast-food restaurants, she says, possibly contributing to high obesity rates there — 30% of adults, compared with about 21% in the rest of the city. Nationally, 25.6% of adults are obese, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.” Exiling The Happy Meal
400 “fat and fast” drive-thrus, walk-ups, and carts or ~ 12 per square mile, or 1 per an ~ 2.4 million square feet, or 1 per 1250 people. Anyone still think we are stomping on the rights of people to get their “hot and greasy” when so many exist already? Think any of those fast food places are providing healthcare insurance to their workers as they delve out those chunks of fat.
The preferred way of minimizing an overwhelming abundance of one type of business is to develop a master plan for that area and zone it accordingly with the appropriate restrictions.”
This is not so much freedom of choice for many as it is one of the sole alternatives for many of the low and middle income brackets due to location and the non-location of fresh food alternatives or even canned food. Store do not locate in blighted areas. Take my earlier comments above a step further, why do you need so many fast food restaurants concentrated in one area? The food is not healthy for you in most cases; but yet, we are afraid to stomp on the rights of a business and its owner to limit location as it becomes a “takings.”
We are not so afraid to stomp on the rights of those who may have no or limited alternative by charging them higher prices if they do not conform to healthcare initiatives mandating they change habits and practices. Have you ever talked to personnel and explain to them the lack of alternatives . . . they do not care as they are following a “policy” or orders which keeps them warm and snuggly in following it. “We were ordered to do so.” Where have we heard this before?
What if a patient’s cholesterol is 118, weight is ~BMI, and they still suffer from heart disease? Will they be penalized in a similar manner? And if you are born with a disorder? While I agree healthier living is needed, I can see this being taken to an extreme by companies.
We will not solve our chronic disease state of health until we go after the food industry in a way the returns food research and production toward health.
The assumption has been for too long that any modification toward shelf life, image, packaging and yield has no effect on our physiology. It’s just wrong.
But then, the major profession charged with our health considered nutrition a non factor for decades. Funny in that 1/2 of their mode of obtaining health is chemistry yet the greatest chemical interaction we have is our diet and they discounted it.
There is more to nutrition and it’s health effects than sugar and cholesterol. Example: new study finding a connection between brain activity and the use of probiotics. Or how about the famous runners who die early from heart attacks, it is known to be an issue of improper ratios of essential fatty acids.
Add to this energy issues and water issues, and returning to regional small agriculture starts to look good again. Only thing is we’ll have to mow down a bunch of those sub developments to get the land back.
i wonder about this. I don’t think you can get far with the “heavy hand of government.” If people want to eat junk, it’s going to be a little hard to stop them with zoning laws and reeducation camps.
On the other hand, as long as the high fructose people control the government and the school boards, it might be a little hard to teach kids what that junk is doing to them.
maybe word of mouth?
Coberly,
That’s the problem. Education such that people make better choices is not enough when fructose mostly from corn is in just about everything.
On top of this we have the chemistry used in animal farming and then we have the issues of meds (mostly hormone and psych drugs) in the water systems. Did you know that female hormones are so prevalent that they are in the soils and now certain green leaf plants are adapting them? This adaptation was thought impossible. The prevalent use of hormones outside of medical need is considered a source of the shift to early puberty. Just think what is going to be happening in another decade or so as more men get on the testosterone kick.
Regulation by government used to be understood as a protection against the immediate. After years of understanding and appreciating the concept of sustained action over a long period potentially creating an imbalance thus harm you would think society would by now have made such understanding institutional. But, I think economics as practiced has trumped all.
Daniel
if people were making better choices, the economics would follow.
but “economics as practiced” means that the people who are in a position to make a lot of money control the “education” and the regulations.
and when i look at the hyenas in Washington I have no hope.