tony de wonderful

https://uk.news.yahoo.com/devon-refu...072533061.html

Bad news for all you obese smokers!

The article makes it sounds like they are being punished because they are more likely to need health care (at greater risk of diseases like diabetes), but it's my understanding that smokers and the obese are more likely to die on the operating table?

andy97

iTrader: (1)

Help thy self to be helped. Yes there are degrees of need, but patients must show some dedication to help themselves.

Lisawrx

iTrader: (1)

Does this apply to any surgery, or just surgery decided to be related to either smoking or obesity (or both) as it's not entirely clear to me? I know it states routine surgery, not emergency, but it doesn't seem to clarify what that exactly encompasses.

dpb

Are you suggesting they should die on the operating table,





It would save some cash I guess

Rob_Impreza99

iTrader: (3)

If you quit smoking you put on weight, they are in a no win situation. If someone challenged that in a european court of law they would have a good chance of winning. So if your overweight, and a smoker, does that mean you don't have to pay national insurance then if you live in that area ? The government will still take their money.

I ain't a smoker or overweight btw

Lisawrx

iTrader: (1)

I also have to say (and I'm not defending smoking) but I love how they've come up with the figures for the cost of smoking to society. If ever there was an attempt to put figures together to suit an argument, that is it.

I want to make it clear, I am in no way attempting to claim smoking is good, but no matter how anti-smoking any group is, it raises more money than it costs us.

Allow for the £3.1bn cost to the NHS (treatment and the social care) as being accurate. The remaining £8bn (premature deaths on productivity and smoking breaks), I'm not sure how this is a remotely accurate figure, and even if it was, how much can the premature death part be offset against savings on pensions, not having to treat those people in their old age etc.? As for smoking breaks, that is very easily solved, don't give them. Where I work, smokers are entitled (rightly) to exactly the same breaks as any other member of staff, which is based on the hours they work. They get no more just because they smoke, in fact if anything, they are probably more closely monitored as they have to leave the building, therefore they need to sign in and out. If businesses are losing money through smoking breaks, that is the fault of those running them, not the individual smokers.

Turbohot

My understanding is that the obese smokers are destined to die anyway, so why bother taking the guilt upon, of them dying on the operation table?

Anyway, as shifting obesity and smoking cessation are very hard tasks, I hope this refusal to operate may sober up some obese smokers, if not all. People do all sorts to avoid dying, not many want to die, if they can help. So this fear factor may help improving health figures on the future data collection chart.

ScoobyWon't

There was a report last week suggesting that the fatties should get free gastric bands. I'll take one, please.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/he...le-on-NHS.html

Apparently after spending on the operation, it'll save lots of £ for the NHS. It also might stop me having to dodge the fat, unemployed ****ers who ride on the pavement in mobility scooters on their way to the takeaway.

Rob_Impreza99

iTrader: (3)

I wonder if the government will reveal how much they generate each year in duty on Cigarettes and Tobacco ? They seem keen to tell us how much smokers cost the NHS, i'd have an educated guess that it's either the equivalent of what they say smokers cost the government or they generate more from the duty on tobacco and cigarettes. Either way smokers are contributing to the government in both the duty on tobacco and cigarettes plus the National Insurance they pay so if you include National Insurance contributions they pay far more to the government than it costs the government to treat them when they need it.

Lisawrx

iTrader: (1)

Apparently for 2012-13, £12.3bn

http://www.the-tma.org.uk/tma-public...-from-tobacco/

As admitted on that page, the VAT is an estimate, but HMRC have supplied the duty figure of £9.7bn, so it's at least that.

I'd call that a massive profit, when you take out figures given by 'the other side' that may or may not be true, and if nothing else, could be changed, and there is a potential flip side.

Rob_Impreza99

iTrader: (3)

As you know yourself Lisa, governments manipulate and massage figures to suit their own agenda. I don't see them having the same swipe at overweight drinkers, it must cost the government at least as much or more in policing town centres at weekends to control drunks, the time in processing the arrests, the cost of court cases from drink related crimes not to mention the cost of treating drink related illnesses.

RA Dunk

Pretty pointless smokers and fatties paying National Insurance now is it...

andy97

iTrader: (1)

Stopping smoking doesn't put weight on, it's the habit of putting an object in your mouth, usually replaced by a Mars bar that puts weight on
I believe if you smoke and are obese, yes a premium should be imposed above the normal contributions

Turbohot

The taste buds respond better, because there's less or no tar on the tongue hence more salivation, better appetite/response to food. Underlying reason is the need to replace their obsessive oral gratification with something else hence increased food intake.

All weighty quitters can try drinking more water instead of eating more food, if they like. If they have to eat, they can munch on a celery or a carrot like a toothy rabbit. This should help.

Rob_Impreza99

iTrader: (3)

As Turbo pointed out, that's the side effect of giving up smoking. Like he says you have better taste buds and tend to eat more food as you get lost what to do with your hands and your appetite grows.

Lisawrx

iTrader: (1)

In the case of smokers, would you not say they are already paying a premium through the large amount of tax on each pack of cigarettes?

Also, whilst the risk of certain illnesses may well be increased by smoking or being obese, it's not a certainty.

Add also to that, what happens if a smoker and non smoker, or obese person and 'normal' person get hit by the same illness, how can penalising one be acceptable because of their lifestyle choice?

dpb

I think they've finished loading the motorists, so they've got to look elsewhere

They'll start on fugly / stopid folk sooner or later

Turbohot

She; if you don't mind.

I'm a female.

Matteeboy

Let them die.
Sick of the lsne excuses; let natural selection take its course.
The levels of obesity and smoking would soon plummet.

JTaylor

Do you think it's possible that some people have problems with addiction, Matt?

Matteeboy

Self indulgent weakness.
Stop eating when you're full. Stop eating nothing by rubbish.
Stop smoking.

Many people with non self inflicted problems go through far, far worse.

JTaylor

No such thing as addiction, then?

dpb

In nature, the slow ones get picked off / don't reproduce

dpb

There's chemical addiction , but that wears off

After that there's psychological weakness

dpb

Just as big a costly problem in western world is anorexia , but its less of a juicy story

JTaylor

Have you been reading Mein Kampf, Duncan?

dpb

No..

JTaylor

Oh, ok.

jonc

Easy to say that when you're fit as a premier league footballer with a resting pulse under 50, who can run sub 6 minutes miles over 5k, swim a mile in under 30 minutes, with no problems doing 100 press ups and 25 pullups, win triathlons, ability to do all sorts of gymnastic stunts, have a bodyfat percentage below 12%, army and combat/martial arts trained and can "handle" themselves better than most and only 39 years old living a fantastically glorious outdoor pursuits lifestyle wind surfing instead of playing computer games.

Just saying.

ps. did I mention you're quite modest too.

hodgy0_2

this is the problem with meddling with the universality of healthcare

it is difficult to draw nice clean lines

so whilst giving liver transplants to (unreformed) alcoholics, or Lung transplants to smokers are extreme examples, and the lines seem clear, it gets trickier

who is more deserving, the 50 year old man with pneumonia, or the 25 year old Mountain Biker, who injured himself riding down a mountain

should the state subsidise his/her dangerous MBT activity, should people doing that sport have some sort of sports insurance

why should a mother wait in A&E, with a sick child, to be seen behind the same self injured drunks that inhabit A&E every Friday night