Care or cure?

World magazine: “There are three kinds of prevention. Primary prevention can be accomplished by modifying unhealthy behaviors (e.g., smoking, physical inactivity), which cause many diseases and account for 38 percent of all deaths in the United States, administering immunizations to prevent infectious diseases, and reducing exposure to harmful environmental factors. Secondary prevention can reduce the severity of diseases, such as cancer and heart disease, through screening programs that detect the diseases or their risk factors at early stages, before they become symptomatic or disabling. Tertiary prevention—the effort to avoid or defer the complications of diseases after they have developed—is the current focus of medical care.” That focus on tertiary prevention is the driving force behind rising healthcare costs.