Guest Editorial: Obesity is taking its toll

Posted on May 7, 2012 |

• Editorial

By Emerson Lynn

In 1986 it was estimated that the cost of obesity in the United States amounted to about 5 percent of total health care spending. Today, that figure has more than tripled to 15 percent, meaning it costs us $350 billion a year to treat.

That’s bad enough. Worse is the prospect that the costs will continue to escalate and that Type 2 diabetes is becoming prevalent among children and teens.

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