Twelve Iowa cities and towns are applying to be demonstration sites for the Blue Zones project, a micro-level experiment in trying to improve health and well-being by Healthways and with funding assistance from health insurer Wellmark.
The 12 Iowa communities hope to join Cedar Falls, Waterloo, Spencer and Mason City as demonstration sites, where leaders from business and civic life are aiming for Blue Zone-certification through a variety of changes to local policy, business practices and, perhaps more than anything, lifestyle.
The basic goal is to make "the healthy choice the easy choice" -- making it easier to bike or walk to work and to drink water, rather than soda, on the job, notes Blue Cross Blue Shield licensee Wellmark in its advertising.
A lot of easy choices right now are partly or largely why so many billions of healthcare dollars are spent treating preventable conditions, Sally Dix, Blue Zones Engagement Manager at Wellmark, said.
"Improving overall health and well-being is really the best health insurance," Dix said.
Conceived by Minnesotan Dan Buettner who travelled the world visiting communities with an inordinate number of centenarians, the Blue Zones project revolves around "9 Power Principles" for individuals to eat healthy, stay active, connect socially and find purpose in life.
Wellmark is spending $25 million on the Blue Zones in Iowa over five years. It's not a grant, Dix said, it helps pay for community planning and consulting from Healthways experts.
"If there's a community doing something really well," like building a bike trail network or managing a community vegetable garden, Dix said, "part of the project is to support that and let it continue."
To get funding for planning, the communities need to meet benchmarks of having 25 percent of community members taking some form of action towards improvement, such as seniors joining walking groups or employers offering fruit instead of donuts.
The progress in the eventual Blue Zone communities Iowa and in existing Blue Zones in California and Minnesota will be measured by the Gallup-Healthways well-being index.
Within the next few years, Healthways will be able to measure the progress in Albert Lea Minnesota, the first sustaining Blue Zone community, started in 2009, said Joel Spoonhiem, manager of community programs at Healthways.
Already, he said, there are signs of progress.
At a manufacturing plant, employees weren't drinking water, preferring soda instead. The company bought everyone large mugs and installed ice machines, Spoonheim said. Water consumption rose and soda consumption fell dramatically.
Then there are the walking clubs and walking school buses, where adults lead a pack of students to school by foot in the morning.
"A guy named Brian, a social worker, who was morbidly obese, came to a walking event because his mom dragged him there," Spoonhiem said. "Over the course of the summer, he lost a lot of weight, and he was eating healthier. He got rid of his depression."
The Blue Zones project is part of Iowa's "Healthiest State Initiative," aiming to be rank first on the Gallup-Healthways index by 2016. The state currently ranks 16 on the list.
In Mason City, one of the demonstration communities that's seeking Blue Zone designation within a year, where two of the largest employers are a Kraft Foods and Cargill plant, Robin Anderson, executive director of the Mason City Chamber of Commerce, said there's already "a buzz" being generated.
"It's really big," Anderson said. "We're talking about fundamentally changing our environment. That's big in every sense of the word."