On average, health care for obese workers costs 36 percent more than for normal weight workers, and medication costs 77 percent more, according to Roland Sturm, senior economist at RAND in Santa Monica, Calif., where he directs the Economic and Policy Research Program.

Direct costs of obesity include medical insurance, hospitalization, physician visits, outpatient testing/treatment, laboratory, radiology and pharmaceutical. Health insurance is responsible for $7.7 billion, followed by life insurance ($1.8 billion) and disability insurance ($800 million), according to the study “Estimated Economic Costs of Obesity to U.S. Business,” published in the American Journal of Health Promotion in 1998.

Indirect costs include decreased productivity and increased absenteeism. Obese employees are twice as likely to be absent 14 or more times per year. Paid sick leave associated with obesity costs employers an estimated $2.4 billion per year.

Even when they are on the job, a quarter of obese workers under-perform because of infirmities related to their weight, estimates Dr. Eve Olson, director of St. Francis Medical and Surgical Weight Loss Center, and author of “Obesity in the Workplace: A Case for Treatment,” (American Journal of Bariatric Medicine, 2003).

Overall, NBGH reports that obesity is associated with 39 million lost work days, 239 million restricted-activity days, 90 million bed days and 63 million physician visits.

More important, obesity significantly affects the health and quality of life of employees. The condition is a risk factor for a large number of chronic diseases, such as diabetes, heart disease, hypertension, musculoskeletal conditions, depression, stroke, poor female reproductive health, as well as endometrial, breast, prostate and colon cancers. It can contribute to the onset of these disorders and worsen them.3