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NHS Pays Fat People

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The NHS are trialing a pay for weight loss incentive program, lets see how this works.

 

Under the scheme payments increase with the amount of weight lost. Someone who loses 50lb, for instance slimming from 15 and a half stone to 12 stone, would receive the maxium amount. Losing 30lb is rewarded with £160, and 15lb with £70.

 

The NHS currently spends £1 billion a year treating obesity-related diseases and those behind the scheme believe introducing incentive payments will reduce the overall bill for taxpayers in the long run. It follows a similar pay-to-quit scheme to encourage people to stop smoking.

 

 

 

Under the Weight Wins scheme, overweight people sign up for a 13-month slimming programme and only get paid if they complete it successfully.

They have seven months to get down to their target weight, with monthly weighings at their GP surgery or health clinic. Six months after that they have to show that they haven't increased their weight again.

The scheme is being trialled by a private health firm in Kent, with NHS backing and funding.

It is aimed at people who are overweight, rather than those who are so obese that they need surgery to limit their food intake.

Around 2,000 people have applied for 400 places on the programme. There are also 40 overweight nurses taking part to set patients a healthy example.

A Department of Health spokesman said: "Obesity surgery is costing the NHS a small fortune.

"That's why we are behind such an initiative. Paying out money to people to lose weight can make sense."

Christine Martin, a public health specialist in Kent, said: "The great benefit is people can lose their weight by whatever means they want. To get given almost £500 for losing weight is a pretty good reward."

But Andew Lansley, Shadow Health Secretary, said: "While incentives can be useful, we are extremely sceptical about whether public money should be handed over in this manner.

"Incentives should be geared around sustaining people's drive to lose weight, for example by encouraging them to do more exercise - not simply handing over taxpayers' hard-earned money."

 

What are your thoughts on this?

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Next they'll be paying suicide victims to not kill themselves a second time.

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I'm slim and slender. Could they not pay me to pass on my secrets to these fat people instead?

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Anorexia isn't a secret.

 

Why is it that the government keep trying to make me jealous of people with unhealthy lifestyles?

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I'm underweight by about half a stone! the NHS should pay me to eat!

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The thing is they should have to pay the money back if they EVER put it back on to keep it fiar.

Martinist, they should, although it is easier to gain weight than to lose it.

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Martinist, they should, although it is easier to gain weight than to lose it.

 

That's not necessarily true.

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That's not necessarily true.

 

It is if you live in the fantasy world of diets, spending two weeks at your targeted weight and then being confused to fucking shit when you dramatically put on the pounds because you're thick as shit to not realise you are better off exercising which the majority of the population fail to comprehend as they reckon the movement of typing on a keyboard is sufficient to constitute as a daily work out.

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That's not necessarily true.

 

I don't think I could physically eat enough food that will cause me to put on weight. It'll all just end up clotting up my insides.

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Chair is right. I look unhealthily skinny and have only recently escaped the "underweight" label. While working out would likely improve my physiology, it'd still only make me more muscular. I'd still be skinny as heck, and I can't for the love of God seem to "get fatter". Oh, and having a hollowed chest (Pectus excavatum) doesn't help.

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I hate all those adverts on TV yapping on about dieting or 'lite' food (The Kellogs one springs to mind). Stop starving your fat arse and do some God damn exercise.

 

Also, some people seem to think doing cardio and avoiding building muscle is the way to go - the main reason being they don't want to look muscley - but they go hand in hand. If you start building muscle you aren't going to suddenly turn into the Hulk. Muscle increases you metabolism for starters.

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I hate all those adverts on TV yapping on about dieting or 'lite' food (The Kellogs one springs to mind). Stop starving your fat arse and do some God damn exercise.

 

Also, some people seem to think doing cardio and avoiding building muscle is the way to go - the main reason being they don't want to look muscley - but they go hand in hand. If you start building muscle you aren't going to suddenly turn into the Hulk. Muscle increases you metabolism for starters.

 

That's spot on. I saw a post on another site somewhere that read "How do I gain just a little bit of muscle? I don't want to be a muscle man." Haha, you don't "accidentally" become World's Strongest Man overnight.

 

It's encouraged for people to weight train if they want to lose weight/fat. A lot of the stuff I've read into seems to suggest that. Of course you'll have to combine it with cardio, but it's good to incorporate it.

 

As for getting paid to lose weight, it's right up there with getting paid to stop smoking. Why is money being used as the incentive here? Surely the incentive should be that you'll be healthier, possibly more fitter, in better shape, etc. Plus, wouldn't it help your own self esteem and confidence? My confidence has rocketed ever since I gained weight, being the skeletor/underweight minion that I used to be.

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I don't think people really care about their health that much anymore, or they just don't realise that being overweight actually hurts them. My dad is a good example of that, he should definitely lose weight but he just keeps on eating all the bad stuff. =/

 

Losing weight doesn't have to be difficult or a chore to do if you do it properly. You don't have to starve yourself even. All you need is a healthy, balanced diet and enough exercise. But I guess in today's society people are encouraged to eat badly and be lazy (I'm often guilty of this too, but at least I'm trying to improve heh).

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I feel that the NHS has set me a challenge: First get to 15 stone and then lose 3.

 

I accept.

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The thing is they should have to pay the money back if they EVER put it back on to keep it fiar.

Martinist, they should, although it is easier to gain weight than to lose it.

 

Thats not true at all, every single person is different. I know martin himself doesn't find it easy to put on weight.

 

Also theres a condition fat people get where the body overproduces insulin after long term unhealthy eating, and it's proven that it destroys attempts at dieting (lots of insulin in your body + not eating as much food = extreme hunger) so losing weight isn't neccesarily easy.

 

 

I've made it no secret that im "fat" and a "dieter" but I've no intentions of claiming money for losing weight. A person should want to do it for themselves, not for money (just like the smoking thread)

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Why is money being used as the incentive here?

 

I was thinking this too. They'll probably just end up spending it on more food anyways.

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We will see how long this lasts when there is no money left in the NHS...

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As for getting paid to lose weight, it's right up there with getting paid to stop smoking. Why is money being used as the incentive here? Surely the incentive should be that you'll be healthier, possibly more fitter, in better shape, etc.

The people being targeted by this scheme are those who don't see their weight as a problem, or at least those not bothered enough to do anything about it. Evidently they don't care for their bodies enough to do something of their own volition, so a monetary incentive is introduced as a substitute; one would hope that once they are in better shape people will have their eyes opened to the less materialistic benefits.

 

It's easy to look down on people for being fat, but that's a very blinkered view. Everyone's prone to bad habits, and once you've lived with them long enough they simply become the unquestioned norm, especially when a large part of society has fallen into the same trap. The lower a country's percentage of the overweight, smokers or heavy drinkers, the more those that remain have to question their lifestyles.

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We will see how long this lasts when there is no money left in the NHS...

 

To be fair, it's probably cheaper paying people to lose weight than paying for treatment for fat-related maladies.

 

They should say "Lose 3 stone to get the chance to win £50,000". Then have a lottery.

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Isn't this article like a year old? :p

 

It was in the Independent today, so I assume the issue has resurfaced for whatever reason.

 

I'd love this so much if I were fat, because it would actually give me an incentive to lose weight.

 

Like if someone told me I'd get £300 if I gained 2 stone, I'd be at the gym everyday.

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They should stop paying people simple as that, smoking and now for weight, bugger off there's a lot of people who do it without the aid of financial benefit from the nhs!

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If it is true, then I should sue them. As someone who has successfully lost 120lbs, I should be reimbursed.

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The big external cost here is the visual pollution of having to look at the fats.

(Epic apologies if you're fat lolwin)

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