This week, Kaiser Permanente, the Labor Management Partnership and the Coalition of Kaiser Permanente Unions kick off KP Walk!, a workplace program that promotes the opportunity for everyone to exercise. Simply put, walking at least 30 minutes a day will make us healthier and prevent chronic conditions such as diabetes, heart and circulatory ailments and bolster our immune systems. KP Walk is organized to create a group commitment with rewards and recognition for all of us. So, I encourage everyone to join the program, lace up your shoes and walk!

Talking change while walking

Let’s make extra use of our walking time. I suggest that union members, Kaiser Permanente managers, physicians and executives use our KP walks to reflect on the relationship between taking charge of our own health and our collective responsibility for changing attitudes in our families, among friends and in our communities. As we stroll, let’s discuss:

• Health care is an economic issue: At the current cost of 17 percent of GDP, health care costs are unsustainable. We must reduce the cost of health care by half if we are to rebuild the nation. Part of the way we reduce health care spending is to reduce the cost of treatment for chronic conditions, most of which are preventable. As we walk, we are contributing to our community’s economic health.
• Health care is a civil rights issue: We know that there are deep disparities in the health of our population based on race and ethnicity. Just as it requires commitment within Kaiser Permanente to support employees to exercise, so, too, must we fight for that right in our schools, communities and workplaces. Getting people to find the time and desire to exercise will not happen just by demanding that they do it. The effort must be organized!
• Health care is a social healer: No other issue can bring people together more than the demand for universal, high-quality health care. It can lay the groundwork for what I believe is the missing, basic political awareness in American society: social solidarity—that is, a commitment that everyone has a right to having certain basic needs met, including health care. Without social solidarity, we will continue to fritter away the vast wealth created by workers and employers without meeting the basic needs of the country.

Look to the younger generation for answers

I try to learn from my daughter, Lucy, in her 20s, and son, Nick, in his 30s. Both are bright and active representatives of a generation that looks around them and sees a nation that cannot figure out how to use its vast wealth to create a safe, clean and peaceful world. What is interesting is that they are not as angry about this as I and others of my generation are. Instead, they want to take ownership over some solutions. For example, Lucy recently wondered what if we could get people her age to start thinking about their own health. “What if we built a movement that promoted health and exercise among people 18 to 40 years old,” she mused. “We need young people to understand that they can contribute more than anyone to reducing the cost of Medicare by arriving at Medicare eligibility age healthy!” Wow!

Let’s walk

KP Walk! is a great opportunity to feel better, get healthier and promote not just our own health, but the need for good health for all, and the relationship of a healthier population to a more just economy.

By walking and discussing the issues of health care, we can be part of the creation of a grassroots movement that can contribute to the kind of dialogue our nation needs so desperately—one that is healing, mutually supportive, caring and visionary all at the same time. By so doing, as we take responsibility for preventing disease in ourselves, we also are demanding that the health care industry be held accountable for eliminating waste, profit and unnecessary costs of all kinds

For those of you in or near Oakland, please join me in discussing these issues and walking around Lake Merritt. If you would like to participate, send an email to LMP-Feedback@kp.org and I’ll send you an invitation. Let’s go!