The Center for Disease Control and Prevention says that 25% of Alaskans are obese. The University of Alaska’s Institute of Social and Economic Research released a report in April that predicted Alaska’s medical costs for the obese children of the current generation will be $624 million.
Associate professor at the Institute of Social and Economic Research Mouhcine Guettabi prepared the report for the Alaska Department of Health and Social Services. He says the report was created with the current generation of children in mind.
“We relied on previously published studies that have estimated how much does it cost or what are the additional costs that are associated with obesity. Meaning, you try to basically estimate how much does an obese person spend on medical cost relative to a non-obese person.”
Guettabi says on average, out of pocket medical costs for obesity related diseases vary between 20 and 30 thousand dollars. The report, Guettabi says, looked at how reducing childhood obesity would reduce the amount of future medical costs.
“What I did was essentially say we already know there are these differential costs for children and for adults, let us figure out A what is the number of obese people by gender and by age in Alaska and let’s multiple the number of obese people by gender times these additional costs associated with obesity in order to get the aggregate cost of obesity for both children, adolescence and adults.”
The age and gender break down is important, Guettabi says, because the probability of obese children becoming non-obese as adults in very low. The report states that 15% of Alaskan children ages two to 19 are obese and another 20% of children who aren’t obese now are predicted to become obese as adults. The Center for Disease Control and Prevention says childhood obesity is tied to a long list of health issues such as type two diabetes, hypertension and heart disease. Guettabi's report says obesity can also cause “serious psychological harm as a result of social stigmatization, depression and poor body image.”
Program Manager for the state of Alaska’s Obesity Prevention and Control Program’s Karol Fink says this report was commissioned because the state needed to know specifically how much obesity would cost in comparison to obesity prevention programs.
“So we are tracking are we making a difference with our interventions but we also want to know is our investment in dollars going to result in an investment in savings in the future. And part of this report is showing us yes if we can reduce the prevalence of obesity in children we can incur savings in the long run.”
Another major cost to consider, Guettabi says, is in the work force. Absenteeism and social stigma are more likely to prevent obese employees from progressing in their career than their non-obese counterparts.
“There are productivity differences, meaning the number of days of work missed exceed those of normal weight individuals. We have discrimination evidence based on weight meaning that obese individuals have a hard time landing positions that they are qualified for, wage differentials. There is a very large body of literature that tries to examine either the productivity losses associated with weight or even school choices or school outcomes in terms of children.”
According to a study from the Trust for America’s Health, Alaska ranks 36th in the nation for the number of obese individuals overall. The Alaska Department of Health and Social Services recommends some form of exercise for 60 minutes every day to maintain a healthy weight. Preventing obesity in children is seen as the best way to lower the obesity rate in the state.