Say you decide to become vegan to help prevent the diseases strongly associated with red meat. As a result, your blood pressure and bad LDL cholesterol levels become much healthier.

Or you plant a vegetable garden to save on food costs and being in nature and getting physical activity transforms your mood, making you less anxious.

Positive unintended consequences can change individual lives and the life of a country.

Take Medicare. When it was born on July 30, 1965, it transformed access to healthcare as well as the health of people ages 65 and older. (Average life expectancy in the U.S. rose from 70-ish in 1965 to around 79 in 2025.)

It also made it so everyone can take more personal responsibility for healthy aging, and so friends and neighbors can support one another. Then all can achieve a younger, happier older age.

Medicare services that help create a healthier population include a Medicare diabetes prevention program (65 million seniors have prediabetes), obesity behavioral therapy (40% of folks age 60 and older are obese), and medical nutrition therapy (less than half of adults 65 and older get the recommended five servings of fruits and veggies daily — and I say you should aim for seven to nine).

If most seniors took charge of their health, and take advantage of the support offered by Medicare, individual lives would benefit and healthcare spending could be reduced by hundreds of millions of dollars annually, keeping you and Medicare running at full steam for years to come.