Invest in prevention, not just medication

More than 15,000 Kentuckians lost their health insurance in the first four months of this year after falling behind on their premiums — roughly three times as many as the same period in 2025.

As a functional nutritionist, I clearly see the driving forces behind this crisis. Every week, I meet with people who are taking expensive medications. Some are overwhelmed with the cost. Others are frustrated that whenever they have a symptom, they receive a new prescription. They question why medication has been the only path offered to them.

It's not hard to understand when you look at the business model.

Big Pharma doesn't benefit financially when an American chooses exercise, a nightly 12-hour screen fast or the elimination of processed carbs. There is no billion-dollar marketing campaign promoting eight hours of sleep. No pharmaceutical representatives are visiting physician offices to discuss the benefits of staying well hydrated.

But those are some of the small changes that have led to the countless transformations I've witnessed in my clients.

The people taking these medications are not the problem. Neither are the pharmacists dispensing them. They are following doctors' orders.

Pharmaceutical companies set the drug prices and they are financially motivated to keep customers on their medications indefinitely. A patient on GLP-1 injections for weight loss is a more lucrative customer than the patient who is prescribed a nutrition protocol.

Beginning in the 20th century, pharmaceutical companies became major financial supporters of continuing medical education and, in some cases, medical schools. At the same time, medical education evolved to emphasize diagnosis and pharmacologic treatment, while nutrition and lifestyle medicine often received comparatively little attention.

As a result, many physicians receive substantially more training in prescribing medications than in using dietary or lifestyle interventions to manage chronic disease.

Modern medicine has saved countless lives and provided life-changing treatment for serious conditions. These advancements are clearly a gift. However, that does not mean that medicating millions of Americans indefinitely is the only answer to our chronic disease epidemic.

A more holistic approach takes into account every symptom, which provides key information regarding health imbalances. I urge my clients to listen to those clues. When your home's smoke detector sounds the alarm, you don't solve the problem by pulling out the batteries. You look for the fire.

Similarly, the human body gives important warning signals when it is unbalanced. Let's say cholesterol is high in one of my clients. I get curious and read the body with a variety of tools to determine the catalyst. Is the foundational issue elevated blood sugar, poorly digested fats, food sensitivities, chronic stress or a combination?

When we simply silence the body's signals using drugs without addressing root causes, we miss the opportunity to correct health problems before they snowball.

I also encourage people to shift their mindset to think more about healthspan than lifespan alone. Imagine two people celebrating their 75th birthdays. One spends her days playing tennis with friends, assisting at church and taking her grandkids to the playground. The other struggles to walk across the living room, manages several chronic illnesses with multiple medications and organizes life around doctor appointments.

Healthspan isn't determined entirely by genetics. It's built through the ordinary health decisions we're making today. Prioritizing sleep, eating a whole food diet, cultivating deep, in-person relationships and getting daily sunshine all support healthier golden years.

When thinking about how to help Kentucky kick its addiction to expensive drugs, we also must be careful to avoid pitting medications against prevention. Both have benefits. That means protecting access to pharmacies while confronting the real driver of unaffordable prescriptions: pharmaceutical manufacturers that set and maintain many of the sky-high prices Americans pay.

Medicines should remain affordable for those who need them. At the same time, we should build a healthcare culture that places far greater value on preventing chronic disease and helping people achieve longer, healthier, and more independent lives.

Kentucky's most powerful healthcare investment isn't found in a laboratory. Kentucky should invest as much or more energy — and money — in helping people get healthier as it does in paying for medications they may never have needed in the first place.

Erin Foushee is a functional nutritional therapist practitioner who specializes in strengthening business teams and optimizing the bodies and brains of leaders.