ASMBS: Gastric Banding Cost-Effective

Wrong. Only not becoming a fatso is cost-effective.

Laparoscopic adjustable gastric banding for obese patients pays for itself in a relatively short period of time, especially for patients with diabetes, according to an analysis of insurance claims.
A review of more than 7,000 cases showed that the net cost to insurers reached the break-even point within four years. The analysis showed that procedures in diabetic patients paid for themselves in half that time, investigators reported here at the annual meeting of the American Society of Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery.

See above.