Despite All the In-Roads We've Made, Are We Still an Unhealthy Nation?

It's undeniable if you look at the broader health statistics indicators and obesity being perhaps the tracer condition. I mean, we certainly smoke less than other countries, and that's a good thing, and we made big strides in the management cardiovascular disease because of that, and because of widespread use of stands and other kinds of blood pressure medication that have managed heart disease and stroke.

We've made significant progress on screening and cancers, but the big, big problem is obesity. Some scholars, economists who have looked at this closely will argue that maybe 25% of the increase in the last 20 years of costs could be directly attributable to the obesity factor.

I'm a Scottish-Canadian-Carlifornian so when I go back to Europe, I'm always struck just about how different it is and if you look at the healthiest so-called best health system in the world which is the French, right I mean, who are still smoking higher numbers than we are and yet they're living longer and living well and I think a lot of it has to do with their attitude towards life and body mass in particular.

I always joke that the reason the French do well is that they walk, they drink red wine and they get naked in the Summer, right? And nothing will keep your Body Mass Index down better than getting naked in the summer.