Lifestyle-related diseases cost a lot of money

Disease Prevention Could Save U.S. Billions of Dollars Annually:

The study authors concluded that reducing the prevalence of diabetes and high blood pressure by 5 percent would save the nation about $9 billion a year in the near term. In addition, conditions related to those health problems would also be reduced, which would increase the savings to about $24.7 billion a year in the medium term.

"Our estimate that $24.7 billion in excess medical spending would be avoided annually if primary prevention were able to achieve a 5 percent reduction in only the conditions we examined can be considered a conservative estimate of the investment in prevention activities that could be offset by medical care savings alone," the researchers noted in a news release from the American Public Health Association.