Ark. Officials Launch Health Initiative

Mon Dec 15, 8:42 AM ET

By CARYN ROUSSEAU, Associated Press Writer

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. - Rising health care costs coupled with the state's high rates of obesity, physical inactivity and smoking are leading Arkansans into a dark, unhealthy future. But under a directive from newly-trim Gov. Mike Huckabee, the state Health Department has put together a plan to attack Arkansas' dire health situation

"There is a light at the end of the tunnel and unless somebody deals with it, it's a train," said Fay Boozman, who directs the Arkansas Department of Health. "When the costs go up, employers won't be able to keep providing insurance."

Boozman has put together a presentation detailing how the department will try to persuade Arkansans to become healthy. He plans to take it on tour next year, delivering it to public health units statewide.

That initiative, along with the draft of an insurance plan that would provide incentives for healthy living, are due to Huckabee in mid-January, Boozman said. The insurance program still is in draft stages and it shouldn't be ready until next fall.

"There are third-world nations where people are healthier than we are," Boozman said. "You can't confuse medical care with health. America is the place to have a heart attack, it's not the place to prevent it."

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, only two states are fatter than Arkansas: Mississippi and West Virginia.

"It's just unacceptable to me that we're one of the unhealthiest states in the country," Boozman said. "Our wonderful way of life is catching up with us."

Huckabee's goal for the remaining three years of his term is to urge prevention, instead of treatment, in a state where the CDC says 24 percent of the population is overweight. The governor used to contribute to that statistic, but has dropped more than 75 pounds since June and wants the rest of the state to follow his lead.

"What can we do to stop people from being diabetic at age 21?" Huckabee asked. "What incentives can we provide? The healthcare system is designed that we are rewarded for unhealthy behavior, but what if you had a certain level of cash benefit?"

That cash benefit is in Huckabee and Boozman's plan to offer incentives that lower the cost of health insurance for state employees. Those incentives would come for lowering blood sugar and cholesterol levels, losing weight and quitting smoking.

Huckabee said he's focusing on the incentives, rather than penalties, such as hiking rates for people considered obese or adding a fee for smokers.

"We would have a hard time legally," Huckabee said. "But we can incentivize people for positive behavior."

For Boozman, the lower rates would be a change that could improve his own life. His doctor told him two years ago that he was at great risk for a heart attack and since then Boozman has lost 50 pounds.

He's says he's the perfect example of how the current system treats the healthy and the risk-laden the same.

"Reality is going from someone who was a heart attack waiting to happen, who would cost us money, to someone who's not at risk," he said. "But I still pay the same (for health insurance)."

Arkansans need to start eating right, stop smoking and exercise more, but the problem is deeper, Boozman said.

"These are the poor water, the bad food, the sanitation of 100 years ago that were fixed through government regulations," Boozman said. "But we're not going to have regulations that you can only super-size two times a week."

It won't be easy, Boozman said, because people find the issues are difficult to face and personal in nature.

"It's interesting when we have infectious epidemics like AIDS, SARS and West Nile virus, the country woke up and started dealing with those," he said.

The situation has become so bad, Boozman said, that Arkansas clinics have seen an 800 percent hike in the number of children with adult-onset diabetes caused by obesity.

The consequences of that are staggering, he said.

"By the time they're in their 40s, we'll cut off their feet, shoot lasers into their eyes," he said. "If you can divorce yourself from the human tragedy of that, imagine how much that's going to cost?"

So just as much as health, money is driving the push, with Arkansans' physical health helping determine the state's fiscal health.

"We could put a future generation of Arkansans in a much better financial situation," Huckabee said. "It's in our best interest because it will cost less in the long run."

If Arkansans would improve their health on the front end, eating healthier to prevent obesity and quitting smoking, it could save the state millions of dollars, Boozman said.

"The major killers are caused by things that are totally preventable," Boozman said. "We are paying for diseases that people don't have to have."

One in five Arkansans have health insurance to cover their problems, a figure that's much too low for Boozman.

"They're one fall off the ladder on the weekend cleaning their gutters from bankruptcy," he said.

Huckabee becomes head of the National Governor's Association in 2005 and he said he will most likely deal with health and wellness issues.

"We need to focus on raising up a generation of people who are healthy," he said. "And who don't need to learn to live all over again."

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