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What does our sickness cost America?
The makers' Newsmax ad answers it the way a family feels it: "you're paying for it with diabetes, with obesity, with illness."
Independent guide. Not the film's makers. We may earn a commission.
The numbers we can stand behind
- Obesity. Gallup puts adult obesity at 37 percent, though it has started to fall for the first time in years.
- Diabetes. Diagnosed diabetes is at a record high of 13.8 percent of adults (Gallup).
- Depression. Nearly 1 in 5 US adults, about 48 million people, currently has or is being treated for depression (Gallup).
- The kids. More than 40 percent of school-age children have at least one chronic health condition, by the CDC's count.
- The pharmacy. Six in ten Americans worry about affording their prescriptions, the highest KFF has ever measured, and 43 percent say cost made them skip or ration a medication (KFF, March 2026).
- The bottom line at home. Only about half of US adults feel secure about affording healthcare, a five-year low (Gallup/West Health, 2025).
You will see "20 percent of GDP" in other articles about health spending. Actual spending is roughly 17 to 18 percent.
The wound you came in with
You work yourself sick to pay for a system that keeps you sick, and one diagnosis wipes out what you saved.
The makers' ad says it again: "sicker, more depressed, fatter, bankrupting our national budget."
Independent guide. Not the film's makers. We may earn a commission.
What the film says about it
The film's first chapter is titled The Medical-Industrial Complex: A Success Story, and its argument is that the sickness is not a cost overrun. It is the revenue.
"The stark economic reality of our current paradigm is that the health care system makes more money when patients are sick, and it makes less money when patients are healthy."
Dr. Casey Means, NPR interview, June 2024
"You only really succeed when people are not well. And it's because there's so much money being made on chronic disease."
Brigham Buhler, former pharmaceutical sales representative, The Dr. Hyman Show
The makers' ads call the 9-episode series free to watch. Check their current offer for access terms and pricing.
The turn
The bill we should refuse is bigger than the medical one. It is the "normal" that comes with it: the idea that a country this sick is simply how things are.
"A healthy person has a thousand dreams. A sick person has only one."
Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Senate Finance Committee, January 2025
The proof that refusal works is already on the board. Red Dye No. 3 is revoked. Petroleum dyes are being phased out. General Mills has reported removing synthetic dyes from its US cereals. The food pyramid has been flipped. Things we were told to accept as permanent were changed because people stopped accepting them.
Independent guide. Not the film's makers. We may earn a commission.
Questions people ask
How much does chronic disease cost America?
We stick to numbers that survive a fact-check: Gallup puts adult obesity at 37 percent and diagnosed diabetes at a record 13.8 percent, and Gallup/West Health found only about half of adults feel secure about affording healthcare. We do not use grand totals whose methods are contested.
Is healthcare spending really 20 percent of GDP?
Health spending is roughly 17 to 18 percent of GDP. The 20 percent figure circulates but overstates it, so we don't use it.
Who pays for all of it?
Working families do, in premiums, taxes, copays and paychecks that stall when someone gets sick.
Where can I watch the film?
The makers' ads call it a 9-episode series, free to watch, at mahamovie.com. Check their current offer for access terms and pricing.