Economic burden of food-related chronic disease in Canada

This blog often refers to the costs of chronic disease and obesity.  However, I have never summarized the financial costs of these health problems in a single place.  So this post simply presents several estimates of the economic burden of cardiovascular disease, diabetes and obesity in Canada.

Cardiovascular disease

Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is still the largest cause of death in Canada.  Estimates on its cost can vary by a wide margin, yet the rule of thumb number that I tend to use is from this report.  According to the Public Health Agency of Canada, CVD is the second most costly contributor to total health costs, conservatively estimated at $22.2 billion per year (2008 dollars).  (See here also.)

Diabetes

This report, titled The Economic Tsunami: The Costs of Diabetes in Canada, claims that the economic burden of diabetes in Canada is $12.2 billion dollars per year (2010 dollars).  In the next decade, this is expected to grow by $4.7 billion reaching $16.9 billion.  The report was funded by the Canadian Diabetes Association.

Also, as my figures per post rate appears to be declining, here’s a figure summarizing the projected costs of diabetes in Canada through 2020.

Obesity

This paper by the Library of Parliament reviews a range of Canadian values and this paper can claim the most cited estimate in the Canadian literature. 

In general, the costs of obesity are estimated to be in the $4 to 5 billion dollar range.  More precisely, Katzmarzyk and Janssen (2004) state:

The economic burden of physical inactivity was $5.3 billion ($1.6 billion in direct costs and $3.7 billion in indirect costs) while the cost associated with obesity was $4.3 billion ($1.6 billion of direct costs and $2.7 billion of indirect costs). The total economic costs of physical inactivity and obesity represented 2.6% and 2.2%, respectively, of the total health care costs in Canada.

However, a report out of Australia figures that the number is much higher.  They estimate that the direct financial costs of obesity in Australia were $8.283 billion in 2008.  Yet, that’s a drop in the bucket compared to their estimate for the overall economic burden for well-being, which equals $58.2 billion.  This is a big number.  But it is probably not so large as to be out of the range of possibility.  (See here for additional discussion.)

So why do I think that food and health policy is important.  Two reasons: i) it is obvious that food-related health problems are generating large costs in Canada and ii) I believe the marginal benefit of a dollar allocated towards food policy is greater than the marginal benefit of a dollar spent on health care (but this really is an empirical issue).