the Baby Boom
Generation evolution continues....
Baby boomers and health issues depend on several factors. While death rates for many devastating diseases have fallen sharply in their lifetimes, they face the diseases that accompany a steeply increased rate of obesity. In addition, very real concerns about affording the costs of advanced medical care that may be needed are an issue for boomers. Baby boomers and health issues go hand in hand as this generation of 78 million people approaches their senior years. Their outlook for a healthy retirement and old age is tempered by both the advantages of modern medical care and its cost as well as some of the ills that have come with the mechanized and computerized 20th and 21st centuries.
On the whole, baby boomers are a fairly healthy generation. In their lifetimes there have been amazing advances in health care and they have been more than willing to take advantage of them. They have utilized vaccinations against once common diseases and have immunized their own children as well. Unlike previous generations, they tend to perceive cancer as a largely treatable disease and not as an automatic death sentence. They are also more willing to adopt the principles of preventative medicine instead of just waiting to get sick and hoping treatment will work.
The recent health care law has revisions that may provide even greater access for baby boomers to health screenings that can provide early diagnosis or even prevention of dangerous diseases before they progress. Screenings for colon cancer, prostate cancer, and breast cancer will be required without co-payments under the new law which should encourage participation.
The scourge of osteoarthritis as a “normal” part of aging is less threatening for baby boomers than in the past. While it still is not possible to cure it or prevent it completely, modern treatments including medications and joint replacement surgery are greatly reducing the disability caused by this common form of arthritis.
Baby boomers do have to deal with a health issue that is one factor in osteoarthritis and that is obesity. A frightening 39% of the baby boomers between 55 and 64 are now diagnosed as obese. Obesity also factors into many other serious health conditions from type II diabetes to heart and circulatory disease to even some types of cancer. Baby boomers and their physicians will have to deal with obesity issues to improve and promote healthier lives.
There are some very positive signs for baby boomers and health as well. They are already forecast to live longer than previous generations and many serious diseases are decreasing. Since the 1950's, the death rate for heart disease has gone down by 60% and the rate for strokes by 70%. In just the last twenty years, the death rate for cancers of all types has dropped another 10% as well. The health of baby boomers rests in their willingness to seek appropriate care, and in their ability to pay for it.