Actually, not.
Posted By: TechSupport on 2009-05-01
In Reply to: That's exactly right! An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. - nm - lall
Surprisingly, most of the studies on the economics of preventive care have not supported the old "ounce of prevention" adage - another bit of unexamined folk wisdom that we take for granted. "It ain't what we know that's the problem; it's what we know that ain't so."
I quote from the "fact check" on Obama's 100-day speech, which quotes from the New England Journal of Medicine:
________________________
OBAMA: "I think one basic principle that we know is that the more we do on the (disease) prevention side, the more we can obtain serious savings down the road. ... If we're making those investments, we will save huge amounts of money in the long term."
THE FACTS: It sounds believable that preventing illness should be cheaper than treating it, and indeed that's the case with steps like preventing smoking and improving diets and exercise. But during the 2008 campaign, when Obama and other presidential candidates were touting a focus on preventive care, the New England Journal of Medicine cautioned that "sweeping statements about the cost-saving potential of prevention, however, are overreaching." It said that "although some preventive measures do save money, the vast majority reviewed in the health economics literature do not."
And a study released in December by the Congressional Budget Office found that increasing preventive care "could improve people's health but would probably generate either modest reductions in the overall costs of health care OR INCREASES in such spending within a 10-year budgetary time frame."
(In other words, the CBO punted the question because even with their research resources they couldn't prove the value of prevention - costs might reduce modestly or might increase. Thanks, CBO!)
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090429/ap_on_go_pr_wh/us_fact_check_obama_8
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