Good health practices can save millions of lives that high-tech machines and expensive medical treatments cannot, Health and Human Services Secretary Louis Sullivan said Friday.
"It's time to make health promotion and disease prevention a national and a personal priority for each American. I want to make it a national crusade," he told reporters from non-Washington media at a White House press conference."I want us to develop a health care ethic that puts a premium on healthy living. Each American must accept personal responsibility for better health behavior and practices.
"That includes the adoption of better dietary behavior; proper vaccinations; the moderate use of alcohol, or even the abstinence from alcohol; and certainly the elimination of illegal drug use and smoking as well as other preventative practices."
Sullivan noted that 40 percent to 70 percent of all premature deaths could be prevented with such lifestyle changes - but Americans seem to be ignoring them while spending more than any other nation on medical care.
"I am sure that we can make great progress and remove the strangle hold that illegal drug use has on our country; we can slow the spread of AIDS virus; we can enhance access to care, as well as contain the high cost of medical care; and . . . help each of our citizens live more healthy and safely."
Sullivan, a black, said he is also upset by reports that blacks have a death rate 1.5 times higher than whites, and that they have less access to health care regardless of their economic standing.
"This is an outrage," he said. "And I will do everything I can as HHS secretary to improve minority health status."
He also renewed his highly publicized comments against smoking. "I have encouraged smokers to kick the habit. I have also spoken about the need for advertisers to voluntarily stop trying to lure young people to their deaths - young people, women and minorities," he said.