Has the Health Care revolution begun? I believe it has and my basis for this belief comes from reading the book “The Tipping Point” by Malcolm Gladwell. The other reason comes from my trip last month to the IHRSA convention when I had the chance to hear Malcolm Gladwell speak. In his presentation what really stood out to me was when he talked about what factors are involved in starting a revolution and how one event or idea can change everything, hence the ‘Tipping Point’. He asked the audience what causes revolutions? Is it money? Political capital? Military strength? And then he answered the question by telling the story of the collapse of the Berlin Wall. What most people don’t realize is that the collapse of the Berlin Wall started by one event. That one event occurred a month before the wall fell and it happened in a small town in East Germany. Essentially, what happened was a group of protestors gathered in a town to protest and instead of the police breaking it up they allowed the protest to continue. Well, word got around and people in the town heard about the protest and decided, well if the police did not stop them from protesting let’s go ahead and have our own protest. This continued day after day until millions of people in East Germany gathered protesting and without any military push back they began to tear down the wall. As Malcolm goes on to speak and states, “the revolution began all becuase one day the town police decided not to stop the protesting of the people of this small town and with that, other towns followed suite. Before you knew it, a month later, millions of people gathered to tear down the wall.”
Okay, so what is my point here and what exactly do I mean by the Health Care Revolution has begun? Well, in my opinion the Health Care revolution has begun because people are going to be forced to become healthy. Yes, I mean forced because the additional 30 million people to the system with out the infrastructure will cause rationing. There is no argument to be made it will happen. If you get sick you will have to wait longer to see a doctor and the only way to avoid having to wait is to make sure you don’t get sick. This is where those of us in the fitness industry should rejoice. Health club memberships should increase and more people will seek our help, so that they do not get sick.
The lesson to take away today is that instead of sitting around waiting to see what happens to Health Care in this country be the first person out there to say, “hey I can help you stay healthy and free from illness” Find ways to benefit from this massive government intrusion into health care. Remember, there are always two ways to look at a problem. One, you can complain and do nothing or the second way, take the opposite approach and find a way to solve it and benefit from it.
Coach Dave