I WAS IN THE GROCERY STORE YESTERDAY. While I was squeezing avocados
to pick just the right ones for my family’s dinner salad, I overheard a
conversation from a couple who had also picked up a fruit.
“Oh, these avocados look good, let’s get some.”
Then looking up at the price, they said, “Two for five dollars!”
Dejected, they put the live avocado back and walked away from the
vegetable aisle toward the aisles full of dead, boxed, canned, packaged
goods where they can buy thousands of calories of poor-quality,
nutrient-poor, factory-made, processed foods filled with sugar, fat, and
salt for the same five dollars. This is the scenario millions of
Americans struggling to feed their families face every day.
The odd paradox is that food insecurity — not knowing where the next
meal is coming from or not having enough money to adequately feed your
family — leads to obesity, diabetes, and chronic disease. Examining this
paradox may help us advocate for policies that make producing fresh
fruits, vegetables, and whole other foods cheaper, while rethinking the
almost $300 billion in government subsides that support the production
of cheap, processed food derived from corn and soy.
At the same time, a Food Revolution, along the lines of that
advocated by Jamie Oliver, a radical chef, can help Americans take back
their table and their health from a food industry that has driven us to
eat more than 50 percent of our meals out of the home compared to less
than 2 percent 100 years ago. And most of those meals eaten at home are
produced in plants, not grown on plants, are from a food chemist’s lab,
not a farmer’s field. Cooking and eating whole fresh foods at home, can
be cheaper, more fun, and simpler than most people think.
So I would ask you to consider: Have you ever made poor food choices
because of cost? What is the REAL cost of this cheap food — the cost in
dollars, on our health, on our environment, and even on the fraying
fabric of our social and family systems?
This is what you need to remember:
- The true cost of unhealthy food isn’t just the price tag — in fact, the real costs are hidden.
- Eating healthy doesn’t have to cost more.
Sure, it seems cheaper to eat a burger, fries, and a soda from
McDonald’s than to eat a meal of whole foods, but there are healthier
options. Let me review why the true costs of eating unhealthy food are
hidden, and give you some suggestions that will help you save money and
suffering by eating well for less. Poverty or financial limitations do
not preclude eating well, creating health, and avoiding disease.
Let’s start by looking at how our economy and public policy are geared toward the production of cheap, unhealthy food.
Government Policy Supports the Production of Unhealthy Food
Unhealthy food is cheaper because our government’s policies support
its production. We’re spending nearly $30 billion a year to subsidize
corn and
soy
production. Where do those foods go? Into our food supply as
high-fructose corn syrup and hydrogenated soybean oil (trans fats), that
are the foundation of almost all fast food and processed foods that are
“manufactured” by the food industry.
Since the 1970s — when our agricultural policies where changed to
support corn and soy farmers — we’re consuming, on average, an extra 500
calories (mostly in the form of cheap, artificial high-fructose corn
syrup) per person.
When you eat unhealthy foods like these, the costs of
medical visits, co-pays, prescription medications, and other health
services skyrocket. Corn and soy are also used to feed cattle for the production of meat and
dairy.
In fact, 70 percent of the wheat, corn, and soy farmed in this country
is used to feed animals used for our food. The world’s cattle alone
consume a quantity of food equal to the caloric needs of 8.7 billion
people — more than the entire human population on Earth!
So, when our government helps pay for these foods — well, of course
they’re cheaper! That explains the low price tag. But what about the
OTHER costs to you?
The Hidden Costs of Eating Poorly
We all know that bad foods are bad for your health. It turns out they
are also bad for the national pocketbook. For example, one expert has
estimated that healthcare costs related to obesity are $118 billion per
year. That’s nearly 12 percent of total healthcare expenditures — and
more than twice that caused by smoking! Seventy-two percent of Americans
are overweight and over one third are medically obese. One in three
children born today will be diabetic in their lifetime and the life
expectancy of our population is declining for the first time in human
history.
A report from the
Worldwatch Institute called Overfed and Underfed: The Global Epidemic of Malnutrition documented the real costs of obesity related to poor diet — and this does NOT include the other effects of poor diet such as heart disease, cancer, diabetes, dementia, autoimmune diseases
, and osteoporosis. Here were some of the conclusions of that report:
- Obese people account for a disproportionate share of health-related absences from work.
- Obesity accounts for 7 percent of lost productivity due to sick leave and disability.
- 7 percent of all of North Carolina’s healthcare expenditures are related to obesity.
- Obese people visit their physicians 40 percent more than normal weight people.
- Obese people are 2.5 times more likely to require drugs prescribed for cardiovascular and circulation disorders.
- Liposuction is the Number 1 form of cosmetic surgery in the US, with 400,000 operations a year.
- Over 100,000 people a year have gastric bypass surgery.
According to a recent study in
The New England Journal of Medicine (
i),
we’re spending about $20,000 per person for each extra year of life
gained from medical interventions like drugs and surgery … as if that’s
something to be proud of!
That doesn’t even take into account the $282 billion in costs
resulting from medical interventions that go wrong — hospital
infections, medical errors, deaths from drug reactions, bedsores, or
unnecessary surgeries.
And what if that $20,000 per year was given to each person during his
or her lifetime to support better nutrition, lifestyle, and stress
management? My guess is that we would save trillions of dollars in
health care expenditures on chronic disease!
As these numbers prove, the costs of eating fast, junk, and processed
foods are often deferred until later. And that’s the key point: When
you go to McDonald’s for a cheap burger and fries, you might immediately
compare that lower price to whole organic foods which are more
expensive in the short term. But the total cost isn’t reflected in how
much you pay for your meal in the immediate moment, it’s the cumulative
cost of what those decisions cost you over a lifetime.
For example, when you eat unhealthy foods like these, the costs of
medical visits, co-pays, prescription medications, and other health
services skyrocket. There are other non-economic costs of eating poorly
as well. You reduce your ability to enjoy life in the moment due to
increased fatigue, low-grade health complaints, obesity, depression
, and more.
The biggest advantage of eating well now is not just preventing
disease and costs later, but simply enjoying each day to its fullest.
You can make that happen. Eating well doesn’t have to cost more.
It’s true that there are very few, if any, subsidies for the
production of produce or healthier alternative foods. And the same
government agency that supports the production of the ingredients for
junk food provides less than $300 million for education on healthy
nutrition.
But change is in the air. Dean Ornish, MD, has shown that a program
to teach people to eat better, exercise, and learn stress reduction can
prevent heart disease and reduce the need for heart bypass or other
treatments. Insurance companies are starting to take notice as some
cover the costs for that program. Paying $5,000 for such a program now,
Medicare has finally recognized, is better than paying $50,000 later for
a cardiac bypass operation.
A number of us advocated last year that a “health council” be
established to coordinate and develop national polices that create and
support health for Americans. This was part of the health reform bill
and the
National Council on Prevention, Health Promotion and Public Health
was created by executive order of the President in June. Drs. Dean
Ornish, Memhet Oz, Michael Roizen and I, among others, have been
nominated to be on a 25-member advisory council that helps guide the
council. The council is made up of all the cabinet secretaries in charge
of departments that in some way affect our health — agriculture,
health, transportation, environment, trade, labor, and more — and will
be chaired by the Surgeon General. This provides a way to influence
national policies to support and create health — including our food and
agriculture polices — for the first time.
The idea that you can save money by eating well is further supported
by studies like the one published by the American Dietetic Association that shows eating well to lose weight is actually cheaper — or at the
worst, no more expensive — than eating poorly! The authors of the study
concluded that “adopting a lower-energy, nutrient-dense diet did not
increase dietary costs over time. Consequently, cost should not be a
barrier in the adoption of a healthful diet.”
That’s powerful evidence that eating well is not just good for your
body, it’s good for your wallet, too!
Here are some ideas to get you
started.
Four Tips to Start Eating Healthy for Less Today
- Listen to Gandhi. Yes, Gandhi! He said that we
should never mistake what is habitual for what is natural. Case in
point: Some Chinese are very poor and yet they eat extremely well —
small amounts of animal protein, with an abundance of vegetables.
- Be willing to learn. We have to learn new ways of
shopping and eating, new ways of ordering our priorities around our
health and nutrition that supports our well-being, even if it is hard at
the beginning.
- Do your research. There are ways to find cheaper
sources of produce, whole grains, beans, nuts, and lean animal protein.
You just need to seek them out. It doesn’t all have to be organic.
Simply switching from processed foods to whole foods is a HUGE step in
the right direction.
- Make an effort. Eating healthy does take more
planning. It may require you to find new places to hunt and gather for
your family. You might have to reorder your priorities regarding where
you spend your money and your time so that you can make healthier eating
choices.
Remember, eating healthy foods without spending a lot is possible-and you can do it.
