Society & Culture - Posted by Geelea Seaford-Duke on Tuesday, October 12, 2010 12:04 - 7 Comments 
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(2 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5) Loading ...Obesity costs workplace $73 billion
"Given that employers shoulder much of the costs of obesity among employees, these findings point to the need to identify cost-effective strategies that employers can offer to reduce obesity rates and costs for employees and families," says Eric Finkelstein. (Credit: iStockphoto)
DUKE (US) — Obesity on the job comes with a hefty price tag. Estimated at $73.1 billion, the sum exceeds the cost of employee healthcare and absenteeism.
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The text of this article by Futurity is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivatives License.
Researchers at Duke University quantified the per capita cost of obesity among full-time U.S. workers by considering three factors: lost job productivity due to health problems (presenteeism), absence from work (absenteeism), and employee medical expenditures. Findings are reported in the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine.
Collectively, the per capita costs of obesity are as high as $16,900 for obese women with a body mass index (BMI) over 40 (roughly 100 pounds overweight) and $15,500 for obese men in the same BMI class.
Presenteeism makes up the largest share of those—as much as 56 percent of the total cost of obesity for women, and 68 percent for men. Even among those in the normal weight range, the value of lost productivity due to health problems far exceeded the medical costs.
As part of this secondary analysis of the 2006 Medical Expenditure Panel Survey and the 2008 US National Health and Wellness Survey, presenteeism was measured and monetized as the lost time between arriving at work and starting work on days when the employee is not feeling well, and the average frequency of losing concentration, repeating a job, working more slowly than usual, feeling fatigued at work, and doing nothing at work. The study included data on individuals who are normal weight, overweight and obese, with sub-groupings based on BMI.
“Much work has already shown the high costs of obesity in medical expenditures and absenteeism, but our findings are the first to measure the incremental costs of presenteeism for obese individuals separately by BMI class and gender among full time employees,” says Eric Finkelstein, deputy director for health services and systems research at Duke-National University of Singapore.
“Given that employers shoulder much of the costs of obesity among employees, these findings point to the need to identify cost-effective strategies that employers can offer to reduce obesity rates and costs for employees and families.”
When all costs of obesity are combined, individuals with a body mass index greater than 35 (grades II and III obese) disproportionately account for 61 percent of the costs, yet they only represent 37 percent of the obese population.
“The disproportionately high per capita and total cost of grade II and grade III obesity is particularly concerning given that these BMI ranges are the fastest-growing subset of the obese population,” says Marco daCosta DiBonaventura of Kantar Health, a coauthor of the study.
With a burgeoning obese population in the U.S., the study has important implications for employers, as they are faced with increasing costs to insure full-time workers.
“Our study provides evidence of yet another cost of obesity,” says Finkelstein. “Employers should consider both the medical and productivity costs of obesity when thinking about investments in weight management or other wellness programs.”
Finkelstein recommends that employers promote healthy foods in the workplace, encourage a culture of wellness from the CEO on down, and provide economic and other incentives to those employees who show clear signs of improving their health via weight loss, maintaining a healthy weight, and/or participation in health behavior activities that have a strong correlation with health improvements, such as walk-a-thons or gym attendance.
The study was supported with funding from Allergan, Inc.
More news from Duke: www.dukenews.duke.edu
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7 Comments
Andrew B.
Having the time period would be helpful. Are the per capita costs of obesity as high as $16,900 PER YEAR for obese women with a body mass index (BMI) over 40 (roughly 100 pounds overweight) and $15,500 PER YEAR for obese men in the same BMI class? Or are those lifetime numbers?
KMN
As usual with obesity studies, nothing in this coverage says that the researchers have found, much less proven, actual causality.
I am curious to know if the productivity losses could be mitigated through accessibility measures and ergonomics. What if comparatively small measures taken by employers could significantly reduce both absenteeism and presenteeism? And what if those measures were applied or otherwise amortized across the entire worker population?
Instead it’s another case of “blame the fatty” and medicalize their physical circumstances. No surprise, since even a quick glance at the Allergan website shows that they manufacture devices for the bariatric interventions including the LAP-BAND surgical device. I wonder if any media coverage of this study will explore the funder’s business interest in the weight-loss industry?
In addition to exploring how accessibility measures might offset these “obesity costs,” I’d like to see a study that compares the costs described here with the proportional absenteeism, presenteeism, and medical costs associated with workers who undergo gastric band or bypass surgery. Oh, by the way, researchers in that imaginary study (who would fund it?), would have to include the “productivity costs” of post-surgery depression treatment and suicide.
Laurie
I’m disappointed you ran a story about a obesity study funded by the company who sells the Lap Band. An authentic journalist wouldn’t have left that conflict of interest out.
Lazy lazy lazy.
Laurie
I’m disappointed you ran a story about an obesity study funded by the company who sells the Lap Band. An authentic journalist wouldn’t have left out that conflict of interest.
Lazy lazy lazy.
Walt
In addition to the LAP-BAND® Allergan also sells Botox. Their web site says that after a DOJ six-year investigation, they pled guilty and paid $375 to DOJ for marketing for ‘off-label’ uses of Botox. Pay paid another $225 civil settlement, for total payment of at least $610 million, not including their own attorneys’ fees.
( Allergan’s version: http://agn.client.shareholder.com/releasedetail.cfm?ReleaseID=503974 )
Duke does itself no favors by accepting money for scientific research from an interested corporation, and then not fully disclosing the potential conflict. Conflict is all about the appearance of conflict.
( Duke’s own news release:
http://www.dukenews.duke.edu/2010/10/workobese.html )
Duke University
Office of News & Communications
615 Chapel Drive, Box 90563, Durham, NC 27708-0563
(919) 684-2823
Betty Bigg
Let’s have a free market system. Allow health insurers to underwrite health insurance premiums like they do for life insurance. Based on statistical histories.
If overweight people do not copst the insurers more, they will not charge them more. If they do cost more, they will have to pay a higher premium. Apply the same criteria to drinkers and smokers.
Accept responsibility for your own actions. That’s the American way. We are getting tired of paying more so you can continue unhealthy practices.
But don’t worry, that’s just a dream. the Dems won’t do it because it will make fat folks feel bad about themselves. And the GOP and Tea party won’t do it because it would raise rates for too many of their supporters.
The cost of maintaining dairy industry jobs is large – add on to this bill the cost of subsidies and the cost of healthcare – and of course the problems of health and quality of life.