An interview with the CEO of the Cleveleland Clinic:
Where do you think the US health care system is heading—and what needs to be done?
...The only thing we can do to reduce costs, while still improving quality, is to reduce the burden of disease. Forty percent of the premature deaths in the United States are caused by obesity, inactivity, and smoking, all of which ought to be preventable. Two-thirds of the country is overweight and a third is obese. Over the decades I have operated on a lot of patients with lung cancer, and every one of them was a smoker. So a natural starting point is to help people stop smoking and help them lose weight.
...new employees aren’t allowed to smoke. Applicants are tested for nicotine, and those who test positive are provided with free smoking-cessation assistance but are not offered employment.
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