FitFeud Corporate Wellness Blog

Driving into the office this morning, I heard this interesting commentary on health care on my local NPR station. Not surprisingly, the commentator, Fred Fiske, focused a lot of attention on obesity and its role in driving up health care costs for individuals and companies. He cites some interesting statistics:

• Employer health care costs have risen 31% in the last five years, which represents the fastest-growing single corporate expense.
• If obesity rates fell to 1987 levels, it would free enough money to cover the United States’ uninsured population.

He also drew attention to some attention-grabbing corporate wellness numbers:

• IBM saved $190 million (on an $80 million investment) by implementing a wellness program. $79 million came from reduced medical claims, and the rest, a whopping $111 million, came from reduced absenteeism and higher productivity.

Finally, in a quote I will repeat over and over, he states that implementing these sorts of programs “serves the interests of the companies, the employees, and the nation.”

Indeed.