Welcome to Debate Club! Please be aware that this is a space for respectful debate, and that your ideas will be challenged here. Please remember to critique the argument, not the author.

What new or revised public policy/law would make it easier for people to maintain a healthy weight?

Options
191012141517

Replies

  • magnusthenerd
    magnusthenerd Posts: 1,207 Member
    lemurcat2 wrote: »

    We don't "price" foods. Price is set by the market. If celery, etc. were basically worthless (nearly free to buy), why would anyone grow them? So what would happen is a greater distortion of the market toward high cal foods. Cool!

    I'm in favor of getting rid of ag subsidies, just out of principle, but I suspect the main result would be slightly higher priced meat and dairy.

    Ah, but I'm not talking about eliminating ag subsidies at all; just the opposite. What if we subsidized crops by lowest calorie density? Take funds from Peter the cattle producer to pay Paul the lettuce producer?

    Told you I was talking crazy.
    Not sure it would work out because calorie dense foods aren't crops, but made from crops. I think you'd need to subsidize or tax at the level of the consumer, or have a tax on the amount of processing done to get a bit closer to altering the prices you'd want changed.
  • h7463
    h7463 Posts: 626 Member
    Theoldguy1 wrote: »
    To add to my comment above regarding fundamental changes as I can't edit it. Probably will have to have some sort of national excise tax on high calorie nutrient poor foods and also eliminate those foods from SNAP eligibility.

    SNAP has the word 'supplemental' in it.... I never understood, why items like candy, popsicles, sodas, energy drinks, and snack crackers are eligible in the first place.... I can perfectly survive without those. No 'assistance' needed on the back of the tax payers.... This would be a policy change that has my vote...
  • h7463
    h7463 Posts: 626 Member
    Carlos_421 wrote: »
    AnnPT77 wrote: »
    Yes, let's pay people more, and ask them to purchase their own health care or services on the open market (or not, based on their own self-perceived economic interests) . . . since expecting most people to plan for and fund their own retirement income has worked out so super well for everyone. :confounded:

    And the government has done better with social security?

    I'm not sure the government did anything directly wrong with social security. The indirect policies for political reasons did hurt - the change in income distribution towards the top where it wasn't taxed for SS is what I think is the biggest failure. An uncapped tax could alter solvency, but addressing income and wealth inequality would be better.

    Flash back to the 1980s, and start reading who built up the fund, and who borrowed and lost it...
  • amy19355
    amy19355 Posts: 810 Member
    I am convinced that the root cause of all problems in this world are READING problems.
  • CSARdiver
    CSARdiver Posts: 6,253 Member
    lemurcat2 wrote: »
    Most medicare care is not "prolonging life without longterm life or life without pain" sort of care. Much of it can secure a full recovery. Therefore, I would note that the immediate movement to that subset of care is a strawman. Most of the latter has 0 to do with expanding subsidized care/gov't care and is an existing issue (perhaps) with Medicare.

    Young guy without insurance gets in a car accident or gets shot or develops cancer all of which may be 100% curable but incredibly expensive to do so is not identical to "I don't want to live for weeks on a respirator." And sorry, but I don't believe young guy who bought crappy health insurance or none because he didn't read the policy or didn't think he needed it is copacetic with not getting the emergency or other care he cannot afford. Nor am I cool with him needlessly dying, but I think he should have contributed to the overall costs.

    The majority of medical costs are spent on two large pools - end of life and emergency care. Much of this is changing rapidly with our evolution in thinking of death and our utilization of hospice. Emergency care has yet to see it's renaissance, but the financial reality make this inevitable.

    There are a minimal number of medical interventions that result in full recovery. Most are merely risk mitigators and due to genetic variation impact <50% of the population. What is fully under individual control is behavior (bearing in mind the nature of the site we are debating this). Your health is largely determined by behavior. Genetics plays a small part in this, but this is a very small percentage of the population.

    It's an interesting legal/moral debate. One the one hand if the young man in this scenario died or suffered injury a savvy lawyer would sue a party for negligence and receive millions in awards. However, the value of effort invested to save the same man's life is expected to occur with minimal compensation.

    If the goal is to reduce cost then logically we would remove all unneeded processes. Insurance and government would be the greatest expenses involved....that is, unless reducing cost is not the goal.

  • ashleygroizard
    ashleygroizard Posts: 181 Member
    I think we have enough laws already.

    People just need to take some personal responsibility. Anyone who's made it past fourth grade should be able to figure this out.

    Eat less. Take a walk. Ta Da.

    Is that all it is to weight loss eat less and take a walk?
  • ashleygroizard
    ashleygroizard Posts: 181 Member
    Or prevent obesity?

    From a maintenance perspective, I wish calorie disclosure would go further. I would like to see mandatory calorie counts for all restaurants and shops selling food items, regardless of number of locations. Not to the extent of sending food to a lab for measurement, but at least calculating calories for all the ingredients and dividing by their serving size.

    I would like to see doctors tell there patients all about weight loss when overweight and helping there patients before they get to obesity. Everyone usually goes to the doctor. And I think if doctors help there patients get to a healthy weight and stay at a healthy weight there would be less people getting obese and overweight. I think the food companies sell to much junk food and should be working on making nice foods that are healthy with less calories and foods that fill people up. My doctor suggested to try and lose some weight and since he said that I’ve gone from 104kgs to 77kgs. Best thing my doctor said to me because now I’m trying to lose weight and get healthy and get in good shape. I’m grateful to my doctor for helping me. Now I’m learning about weight loss walking and eating less and drinking more water and cut out most junk food and try to stick to drinking water sugar free energy drinks and coffee and bike riding and not interested in getting my license back because I’m happy walking most places and walking to public transport to go thirty minutes or more out of town by bus and train. I really think doctors should help there patients so the world can be happier and healthier and fitter.
  • ashleygroizard
    ashleygroizard Posts: 181 Member
    AnnPT77 wrote: »
    I think we have enough laws already.

    People just need to take some personal responsibility. Anyone who's made it past fourth grade should be able to figure this out.

    Eat less. Take a walk. Ta Da.

    Is that all it is to weight loss eat less and take a walk?

    If you eat enough less, and take a long enough walk, yes. ;)

    Your right because I have been eating less and walking 270minutes to 630 minutes a week or sometimes more and I’ve lost heaps of weight. It does take time but it works. Weight loss can be very slow but I’m learning patience and trying to stick to my habits
  • lemurcat2
    lemurcat2 Posts: 7,887 Member
    How many calories does doing my taxes burn?
  • tbright1965
    tbright1965 Posts: 852 Member
    First, great job on the loss of 27kg.

    The question is how can doctors help in a "don't offend me" world?

    I've lost 50# and my doctor told me he wishes even half of his patients took it seriously.

    Like most anything else, others cannot do it for you. One cannot be coached if they are not willing to be coached.

    As someone said above, anyone with a 4th grade education should know to eat fewer chips(crisps) snack cakes and soda and more fruits, vegetables and drink water.

    But a casual glance in the typical shopping cart will see people are spending more time in the snacks and soda aisle than they do in the produce aisle.

    People have to want to make changes for any help from the doctor to become effective.
    Or prevent obesity?

    From a maintenance perspective, I wish calorie disclosure would go further. I would like to see mandatory calorie counts for all restaurants and shops selling food items, regardless of number of locations. Not to the extent of sending food to a lab for measurement, but at least calculating calories for all the ingredients and dividing by their serving size.

    I would like to see doctors tell there patients all about weight loss when overweight and helping there patients before they get to obesity. Everyone usually goes to the doctor. And I think if doctors help there patients get to a healthy weight and stay at a healthy weight there would be less people getting obese and overweight. I think the food companies sell to much junk food and should be working on making nice foods that are healthy with less calories and foods that fill people up. My doctor suggested to try and lose some weight and since he said that I’ve gone from 104kgs to 77kgs. Best thing my doctor said to me because now I’m trying to lose weight and get healthy and get in good shape. I’m grateful to my doctor for helping me. Now I’m learning about weight loss walking and eating less and drinking more water and cut out most junk food and try to stick to drinking water sugar free energy drinks and coffee and bike riding and not interested in getting my license back because I’m happy walking most places and walking to public transport to go thirty minutes or more out of town by bus and train. I really think doctors should help there patients so the world can be happier and healthier and fitter.

  • CSARdiver
    CSARdiver Posts: 6,253 Member
    edited April 2019
    ceiswyn wrote: »
    ceiswyn wrote: »
    It is my understanding that a significant number of the 'emergencies' seen in US hospitals wouldn't have been emergencies had they been treated earlier. But the health insurance model makes people, especially on low incomes, reluctant to seek said early medical treatment.

    Maybe, instead of forcing hospitals to absorb the costs of emergency care, the costs are owed by those getting the care. Since patients can ignore the bill for emergency care, you may lower costs by changing the system so the patient is on the hook for the costs, period, making it a better choice for them to get care early, when the costs to them are lower.

    When costs are shifted to others, there is no incentive to change behavior.

    When costs are borne by those who incur them, they tend to seek lower cost solutions.

    Except that people are already trying to avoid incurring costs - by avoiding getting healthcare in the hope that the problem will go away / wait until they can get to a physician that will cost them less.

    In other words, people trying to avoid incurring costs is actually the problem. You're not going to fix that by making it worse.

    I see this argument brought up when attempting to pitch for socialized structures, but there isn't much truth to this.

    By doing this you aren't addressing the root cause of unlimited demand and decreasing supply. In fact you are making the problem considerably worse.

    If you actually want to help the healthcare problem you can either address the demand problem by reducing the need for care...or increase the number of practitioners.
  • ceiswyn
    ceiswyn Posts: 2,256 Member
    I don't wish to bring back debtors prison.

    If hospitals can just pass along the costs of those who don't pay to others, what is their incentive to keep costs low?

    Don't allow them to pass those costs along to others.

    If they are really losing money, they will have far more incentive to find a way to lower costs than if they can just pass them along.

    Finally, nothing prevents those from believing something needs to be done to help those who cannot pay from opening their wallets and living out their values.

    It's easy to say "the rich" or "the government" or some other group should pay. That's not generosity. Spending other people's money is never generosity or caring.

    Generosity and caring is what you personally do with YOUR time, YOUR talent and YOUR treasure.

    So what happens to people who actually can't afford to pay?
  • CSARdiver
    CSARdiver Posts: 6,253 Member
    kimny72 wrote: »
    CSARdiver wrote: »
    ceiswyn wrote: »
    ceiswyn wrote: »
    It is my understanding that a significant number of the 'emergencies' seen in US hospitals wouldn't have been emergencies had they been treated earlier. But the health insurance model makes people, especially on low incomes, reluctant to seek said early medical treatment.

    Maybe, instead of forcing hospitals to absorb the costs of emergency care, the costs are owed by those getting the care. Since patients can ignore the bill for emergency care, you may lower costs by changing the system so the patient is on the hook for the costs, period, making it a better choice for them to get care early, when the costs to them are lower.

    When costs are shifted to others, there is no incentive to change behavior.

    When costs are borne by those who incur them, they tend to seek lower cost solutions.

    Except that people are already trying to avoid incurring costs - by avoiding getting healthcare in the hope that the problem will go away / wait until they can get to a physician that will cost them less.

    In other words, people trying to avoid incurring costs is actually the problem. You're not going to fix that by making it worse.

    I see this argument brought up when attempting to pitch for socialized structures, but there isn't much truth to this.

    By doing this you aren't addressing the root cause of unlimited demand and decreasing supply. In fact you are making the problem considerably worse.

    If you actually want to help the healthcare problem you can either address the demand problem by reducing the need for care...or increase the number of practitioners.

    So are you saying the reason health care is so expensive in the US is a supply/demand issue? Honest question, I know my opinions in this area involve a lot of emotion, so I try to keep my yapper shut and soak up info :lol:

    Aren't the insurance companies a primary driver of the costs right now?

    I agree and find that emotional response usually ends up badly. There are several issues at play and what is needed is a balanced approach.

    The US system took on the worst points of both worlds. Heavily regulated on price (via insurance and government) and supply (regulations and education). The only thing keeping the system going is innovation, which is on the decline.

    Insurance is a primary driver because it has too much control over the process. To address this you simply remove the influence on the system. ...but change brings fear and few people have the stomach to change even if it means things will likely be better.

    Compare the cost of medical treatments outside of insurance coverage - eye correction and cosmetics/aesthetics medicine. These industries must evolve and adapt as they have no insurance or government safety net. The cost of goods is continually driven down via innovation and follows consumer price index. Medicine covered by insurance however exceeds this index by a monumental margin.
This discussion has been closed.