Could health insurance really be the reason for higher obesity rates? Possibly! According to Wall Street Journal blog, individuals with private health insurance had BMIs of 1.3 points higher than those without and people with public health insurance BMIs were 2.1 points higher. Health Affairs reports that having the safety net of health insurance, people are more likely to eat more and not care as much about the health effects because they have the mentality that they can just go to the doctors (since they have coverage).
While this does seem like an interesting correlation, I don’t agree. My take on these statistics are that the rates of obesity are rising regardless of health insurance and the reason why people with public health insurance such as Medicare and Medicaird have higher BMIs is because they are older. The body’s metabolism slows down as you age and if people continue to eat as they always have or more than they used to, they will gain more weight. Another possible reason for the increase in weight gain is because of the medication older Americans take. Many medications have weight gain as a side effect and since much older American take medication; it’s why they are packing on the pounds.
The higher BMIs for individuals with private health insurance means that they most likely already were on their way to gaining the weight so they found coverage because of it, or they were already suffering from health problems because of the weight gain.
What’s your take on these statistics?
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Fri, Aug 7, 2009
Health Insurance