Unacceptable Pain, Limitations and Costs
While many people mistakenly think of arthritis as an inevitable part of aging, or as nuisance aches and pains that afflict only the elderly, it actually strikes people of all ages. Two-thirds of people with arthritis are under the age of 65, including 300,000 children.
Arthritis can be severe, debilitating and even fatal. Annually, the disease causes about 44 million outpatient visits, almost a million hospitalizations and more than 9,000 deaths. Nearly 21 million adults report activity limitations due to arthritis. In fact, arthritis is a more frequent cause of activity limitation than heart disease, cancer or diabetes, and more than half of all adults with diabetes or heart disease also have arthritis.
At the current rate, an estimated 67 million Americans (one in four adults) will have a form of the disease within 20 years. Moreover, arthritis and related conditions cost $128 billion annually in medical expenses, lost earnings and reduced productivity. The Arthritis Foundation maintains that the heavy toll arthritis takes is unacceptable, and that arthritis must be taken as seriously as other chronic diseases because of its devastating impact.
Read more about this topic: Arthritis Foundation
Famous quotes containing the words unacceptable, limitations and/or costs:
“There is no such thing as inner peace. There is only nervousness or death. Any attempt to prove otherwise constitutes unacceptable behavior.”
—Fran Lebowitz (b. 1951)
“The only rules comedy can tolerate are those of taste, and the only limitations those of libel.”
—James Thurber (1894–1961)
“That which costs little is less valued.”
—Miguel De Cervantes (1547–1616)