» Posted by Martin Weil on February 18, 2010

In statements and letters, Anthem and WellPoint have explained what the industry calls a recessionary death spiral: as unemployment and declining wages prompt healthy people to drop their insurance, the remaining risk pool becomes sicker and more expensive to insure, which in turn forces up prices and pushes more people out of the market.

From an article in the NY Times on Anthem's much criticized plan to raise rates by 39% in California.

Having just been billed $35,000 for my daughter's four hours in a San Francisco hospital OR (and yes it was covered, by Anthem no less, and yes, the hospital got much much less than they billed), I can only stand in disbelief at those who do not see that our current health care financing system is utterly broken.

» Posted by Martin Weil on February 12, 2010

I first heard food writer Michael Pollan last year and was struck by his statement that staying healthy was a pretty simple task. All you had to do was to "Eat Food." By that he meant avoiding processed food and eating fresh. Don't worry about supplements and all the competing health claims that are put out year in and year out, just shop more from the outside edges of the supermarket, where the fresh stuff is, and less from the inside aisles where the packaged and frozen stuff is.

In a recent Commonwealth Club lecture, Pollan made the point that it is our American diet - a lot of fast food and heavy in red meat - that is killing us, as well as greatly increasing our carbon footprint. Cardiovascular disease and diabetes are the main symptoms. And this is supported by the government's agriculture subsidies to corn growers (that feed the cows), feed lots and the elimination of the normal OSHA, environmental and health restrictions that apply to most other industries. This is where agriculture policy intersects health policy. It is not a pretty picture.

According to Pollan, eating less meat would be the single thing we could do to improve our health, lower our health costs, reduce our dependence on foreign oil and lower our carbon footprint. As close to a no-brainer as I can think of. Not suggesting vegetarianism in any way, Pollan said that were an average meat eater in the US (who eats 400 pounds a year of the stuff) to reduce their meat consumption by just 20%, the greenhouse gas emissions savings would be the equivalent of swapping a Hummer for a Prius. Something to think about as the debate rages over these issues.

Pollan's books are In Defense of Food, The Omnivore's Dilemma, and Food Rules.

» Posted by Martin Weil on January 16, 2010

Say you order a Venti Caramel Brulee Creme with nonfat milk? That's 480 calories, 70 of which are fat. Or how about a Venti Double Chocolaty Chip Frappucino Blended Creme with whipped creme? Friend, you just inhaled a whopping 670 calories, 200 of which were pure fat....

Some of these things are like pouring rendered tallow directly down your throat. I'm actually not kidding: If you ate a half stick of butter you still wouldn't come close to the calorie count of a Venti Pumpkin Spice Frappucino Blended Creme.

So writes Clive Thompson on his blog.

» Posted by Martin Weil on September 14, 2009

And you can do it too. Sign up here to become an organ donor.

» Posted by Martin Weil on September 04, 2009

This video from Britain may just slow them down. Warning: very graphic.

» Posted by Martin Weil on November 09, 2008

The LA Times weighs in with a recent article on options for overseas medical procedures for US citizens seeking to reduce their health care outlays and increasingly those seeking superior options to those available domestically.

One source for information cited by the Times is Planet Hospital.

My earlier entry on the subject dates to 2006 is "Heart surgery in Malaysia..."

» Posted by Martin Weil on January 04, 2008

From a UC Santa Cruz study

» Posted by Martin Weil on November 15, 2007

My son just turned 21 (Happy Birthday, Cole!) and received the large cash payment I had promised him back at the age of 12 or 13 if he could honestly say that he had never tried smoking. Apropos of my blatant bribe to affect another person's behavior, comes this:

If you're a smoker, the pack of Marlboro Reds or Camel Lights you're inhaling might only be around $8, but the cost to your life could be many times more. ... Every pack of cigarettes that an adult male smokes knocks off $222 from the value of that man's life, estimate W. Kip Viscusi and Joni Hersch of Vanderbilt Law School in a new NBER working paper. For women the results are slightly more muted but sizable at $94 per pack in 2006 dollars. The reason for the discrepancy is that men earn more than women over their lifetimes and are at greater risk of dying from smoking-related illnesses.

From Portfolio.com

» Posted by Martin Weil on August 27, 2007

One of twenty patients acquire a secondary infection while hospitalized, infections that are increasingly resistant to existing antibiotics. Asking that hospital staff clean their hands before treating you, and asking visitors to clean their hands is the number one way patients can reduce infections during a hospital stay. The entire list of fifteen recommended steps for hospital patients can be found here.

» Posted by Martin Weil on August 21, 2006

CNN Online explores the growing trend of medical tourism - from dental work in Hungary (Yes) to organ transplant in China (No), with stops in Costa Rica, Brazil, Malaysia, the Philippines and India.

Interestingly, businesses are slowly starting to recognize the savings of having elective surgeries in these far-off locales and are reimbursing employees for the costs.