When you are obese, everything is bigger, just like Texas.  You would spend $1,500 more on healthcare every year and that is 41% more than an average-weight person spends each year.

All in all, 9% of all medical expenses are spent every year for obesity in the United States.  That is a whopping amount of $147 billion.  And that could even worsen as nowadays, the average American is 23 pounds overweight.  The figures are rising with the expanding body mass indices of the population.

The higher price tag extends to all areas of medical spending, including prescription drugs and Medicare.

The average American dishes out $3,400 on medical expenditures every year, but that number jumps to $4,870 if the person is obese, said a research published in the journal Health Affairs.  That’s a big difference as you could have already paid your home’s monthly mortgage with that extra thousand dollars.

The cost of obesity is 72% higher for prescription drugs. An obese person can expect to pay $1,400 more on medications than a normal-weight individual. This explains why Medicare takes a major hit.

Over-consumption of soda is blamed by the experts as the cause of the boom in obesity.  They believe a soda tax will help cut the consumption of soda, and the revenue raised can be used to curb the obesity epidemic.

Well, that is a good idea.  They might as well impose taxes on ice cream and chocolates– just some of the major sources of gazillion calories.