Tests of dubious value drive up health costs: study

More "so close and yet so far."

"For all the talk about aging baby boomers bankrupting the U.S. health care system, the real cost culprits may be tests and treatments of dubious value, according to a government study released on Tuesday.

Medical costs are growing far faster than the population is growing and aging, Congressional Budget Office Director Peter Orszag said in releasing the report. If nothing is done, health care would eat up half the economy in 75 years, he said."

Fat people will likely eat it up sooner. After all, they are eating up everything else.

But, this is for sure:

"A lot of what we deliver is of dubious value," Orszag said.

The solution is only part right:

"Orszag, who is expanding his agency's health team before an expected deluge of health legislation in the next few years, called for a national push in public and private sectors to learn which treatments work best, and how they stack up against alternatives that may be older or cheaper but just as effective."

We should also recognize what "treatments" have no hope of succeeding since the problems they address are not solvable by medical intervention, i.e., overweight and obesity (and here).

And we should recognize how people are being led away from getting themselves fitter and towards getting sicker by the killer weight loss industry, including: doctors, Big Pharma, diet gurus, the media, the government and medical centers.

"He said that changing payment systems -- which now reward highly specialized doctors who perform many procedures -- would be only one part of the challenge. The cultures of both doctors, who want to do more things, and patients, who demand more and more treatments, would also have to change, he said."

The time is now to reward socially responsible members of society who get and remain fit, because "Fitness is the only REAL preventive medicine. (tm)"