Health professionals at the Partnership to Fight Chronic Disease recently published the National Factsheet on the Impact of Chronic Disease in the United States.
The purpose of this factsheet is to estimate the projected cost of chronic disease throughout the U.S., from 2016 through 2030. The total estimate is $42 trillion.
The data shows that over 190 million Americans -- which amounts to approximately 59 percent of the U.S. population -- are currently impacted by one or more chronic diseases.
Unfortunately, having one chronic disease can greatly increase the chances of developing additional chronic diseases. If health care leaders do not make any further changes, the amount of people who have three or more chronic illnesses will rise to 83 million by the year 2030.
With this estimated increase, the overall cost will exceed $42 trillion.
The factsheet demonstrates that if Americans can make small health changes, they can improve their own health while lessening the cost burden for the U.S. Some small changes the general population can make include increasing physical activity, reducing obesity, improving treatment rates and decreasing smoking -- saving $116 billion annual. In addition, health care leaders can develop treatment advances to improve care delivery, heighten cancer survival, stall Alzheimer’s onset and create more effective treatments, saving $418 billion annually. In total, this would save the U.S. $6.3 trillion from 2016 through 2030.
Currently, chronic diseases cost $2 trillion in U.S. medical costs. In addition, another $794 billion is spent each year because of lost employee productivity in businesses.
