Green area highlighted denotes the health reform section in the White House transcript of President Obama’s State of the Union Address, a little less than 8 percent.
My fellow Americans: President Obama read through nearly half of his 2010 State of the Union speech Wednesday evening before he arrived at, and all-too-briefly reviewed, what I still consider the nation’s number one challenge, and indeed crisis: health care.
Interestingly, he described it as health insurance reform, which is a curious refinement from “health reform” or “health care reform.” More unfortunate is that the subject of health reform as Mr. Obama’s #1 agenda item – prior to Scott Brown’s surprise win of the open Senate seat in Massachusetts just nine days earlier -ultimately won less than eight percent space and time overall in the President’s speech.
Whatever your politics, the newly sidelined health reform and our declining health as a nation deserved more time and a profound call-to-action from our leader.
His only reference to the country’s collective personal health was his mention of Mrs. Obama’s national effort to tackle childhood obesity, a near runaway problem affecting not just one-third of children, but two-thirds of U.S. adults, warns the January 2010 Surgeon General’s report released in conjunction with the initiative. (“And by the way, I want to acknowledge our First Lady, Michelle Obama, who this year is creating a national movement to tackle the epidemic of childhood obesity and make our kids healthier.”)
Our national epidemic of childhood obesity earned 33 words out of 7,124 in the State of the Union.
As President, Mr. Obama’s job, besides heading the government, is to lead the people, and that includes the state of our health. That means more than relegating the job to his spouse or to the Surgeon General or to the HHS Secretary. That means more than tasking both sides of Congress to broker some, any kind of deal, to reform health insurance. What it should mean is Mr. Obama telling Americans that their own health directly relates to the country’s economic health, as well as to their own personal financial wellbeing.
I’d prefer that another 7.5 percent of the SOTU was spent on challenging the American people and American businesses to adopt healthier practices, starting tomorrow. For example:
- To parents: Guide your children to eat healthier meals in appropriate portions.
- To municipalities, public health officials, and businesses: Encourage quality grocery stores to open in “food deserts” in urban communities.
- To all Americans: Get up and exercise, as does the President.
Often a result of obesity, “diabetes has become such an issue in the U.S. that the American Diabetes Association labels it a ‘public health crisis,’ with 24 million Americans suffering from diabetes and costing the American health care system $116 billion a year,” reports Hilary Kramer of FORBES in “Diabetes Is Killing Our Economy” January 13, 2010.
Mr. Obama missed the opportunity to profile how the growing cost of health care – and how America should pay for it – relate to the toll on our health when America collectively lets itself go, insured or not.
However the government fixes health care or health insurance, we need leadership from the very top to promote what we can and must do for ourselves at the same time.
Tags: obesity, State of the Union
