Approximately 700,000 staff of the NHS (in the UK) are thought to be "overweight" or "obese", out of 1.2 million employed. Gee, that's about, what, 58%? I'd say that pretty much reflects the rest of the population, wouldn't you?
Overweight and obese midwives, health visitors and nurses will be encouraged to enrol in programmes to help them lose excess pounds.
And I'll bet those 700,000 fat employees (if they enroll and follow directions assiduously) will be just about as successful at losing and maintaining that weight loss as the rest of the fat population has been. Oh yeah, bitch that I am, I'm so looking forward to the doctors of these fat NHS employees reaming them new assholes for not being successful at weight loss maintenance, just like they ream the fat public who aren't successful. Let them get a taste of the medicine they dish out to the fat public and see how long it takes them to come up with excuses for why it doesn't work for them but should work for the rest of us.
"In addition, the credibility of health messages is also supported by the behaviour of health professionals, for example in the reduction and current low levels of smoking among doctors.
"Over the next year, we will develop bespoke programmes to support achieving and maintaining a healthy weight for key frontline staff who advise and interact with children and families on obesity, such as maternity staff, midwives, health visitors and school nurses."
Dudes, smoking and stopping smoking is a whole 'nother ball of wax from losing weight and keeping it off. Smoking is not something that will kill you if never do it ever again, but I can guarantee you that if you never eat another bite of food, your life is going to be very fucking short (and that's only if you can keep from eating, and the only ones I've seen who are successful with that are people with EDs and the enforced starvation of WLS patients).
Oh, and good luck with developing those programs to support achieving and maintaining a "healthy" weight for those staff. You've been just so successful at developing those same programs for the fat public and they just work so wonderfully well, dontchaknow? ROFLMAO!!!! I can hardly wait (what do y'all want to bet that when their success rates for fat employees aren't any better than their success rates for the fat public, this quietly gets dropped and we never hear another word about it?).
I just worry that they may end up solving the problem by firing the fatties and hiring or promoting "normal" weight people to take the place of the fat ones.
ReplyDeleteIf they do that, pooklaroux, then they're as much as admitting that there is no way to safely and permanently make fat people thin, which highlights even more the hypocrisy of the medical establishment (damn, that reminds me of my much younger years and hearing "Down with the establishment" on the news all the time when the hippies were protesting).
ReplyDeleteOh yeah, bitch that I am,
ReplyDeleteCall me bitch number 2.
I'm so looking forward to the doctors of these fat NHS employees reaming them new assholes for not being successful at weight loss maintenance,
Indeedy.
Let them get a taste of the medicine they dish out to the fat public and see how long it takes them to come up with excuses for why it doesn't work for them but should work for the rest of us.
My keyboard's at the ready to take note of those excuses.
(what do y'all want to bet that when their success rates for fat employees aren't any better than their success rates for the fat public, this quietly gets dropped and we never hear another word about it?).
As a bookie, I wouldn't give you evens.
Vesta, actually this scares the crap out of me, because like pooklaroux I have a horrible feeling that that when those staff don't lose the weight they'll end up being fired a la those Air India cabin crew (after all we're in a recession and there was a surplus of doctors and nursing staff even before it began).
ReplyDeleteAnd then they'll come for the teachers - after all you can't exactly have someone who's 30st and at the top of their career parroting the line that being fat equals complete moral and personal failure, can you? Under rules like these two of the most inspirational teachers I ever had could conceivably end up cleaning the school rather than teaching in it, if they were lucky.
If this really gathers momentum even I won't be safe; I work in a city planning department where management are already making noises about weight-loss competitions and how best to 'encourage healthy lifestyles'. Of course 'encouragement', like 'choice', mean entirely different things in the hands of public health zealots and become friendly-sounding alternatives to 'compulsion'.
Whether or not this proves that they can't make fat people thin, or they just pin it on our 'lack of willpower' (personally I can't think of many things that would focus the mind more effectively than the prospect of penury) thousands will find themselves jobless and potentially tens of thousands more subjected to a repressive workplace regime of weight-loss targets and competitions and unwarranted intrusion into one's right to body autonomy.
Richie - You have a very good point, and one I hadn't considered. And I think you're very probably right. After all, when those programs aren't successful for the majority of the fat population, it's the fault of the population, not the fault of the program. So why would it be any different with government employees? If they can't get thin following the government programs designed to make them thin, it's not going to be the fault of the programs, it's going to be the fault of the employees, either for lying about compliance or just not working at it hard enough/at all. In which case, firing said employees and replacing them with thin employees who don't have to starve and exercise 4 hours a day to try and get thin will be the order of the day. Thing is, I don't think there are enough thin people who are qualified to replace all those fat workers. And if those workers get fired for being fat, is the government going to be able to support all of them who can't find jobs because they're fat? Talk about cutting your nose off to spite your face................They're trying to say that being fat is costing the government billions of health care dollars, and what is actually costing the government so much money are the facts that yo-yo dieting has made people fatter than they would have been had they not dieted, the government doesn't have a fucking clue how to safely and permanently create a thin person from a fat person, has promoted this impossible-to-attain thin ideal, and now has to support all the fat people who can't find jobs because the government has brainwashed themselves and businesses into thinking that fat is automatically unhealthy and costing billions of dollars so fat people can't get hired and pay taxes because they supposedly cost too much money. What a clusterfucktastrophe.
ReplyDelete"clusterfucktastrophe" pretty much sums it up. As you point out, when we're all on benefits we'll no doubt be blamed for costing the country money in that way too, like the poor Chawner family who found themselves the focus of a national hate campaign and have apparently now had to go into hiding.
ReplyDeleteSomething tells me that those fat NHS employees are not going to be the people who've been preaching about weight loss and suggesting draconian interventions. Au contraire, as those most likely to appreciate the way things are going where fat is concerned, they're our potential allies, a counter to the obesity hysteria, and the powers-that-be know it. There's something rather chilling about the idea of the medical and other professions being purged of anyone who might risk exposing the obesity crusade as the sham that it is. Welcome to NuLabour's prison Britain, where no dissent will be tolerated.
I am hanging onto the hope that with 700k overweight/obese workers now being thrust into the "diet machine", that they will see the absolute ludicrousness of it all. Maybe then they will realize that we fatty fats may actually have been telling the truth about what we ate and how we exercised for all these years. It would be great if they could actually test your blood for chocolate sundaes, bbq ribs, and fried chicken....along with the amount one had. Maybe once they saw the results, which showed the fatties didnt eat nearly the foods nor the amounts they suspected, they would give up this fuckery altogether.
ReplyDelete*sigh* And then I woke up.
I just saw an article a few days ago (yesterday?) from the BBC that had a line that said that fat people do not lose weight via diet and exercise. Just matter of fact like that... It's like every now and then there is a little ray of reason peaking through the clouds...
ReplyDeleteI hope this trying to make healthcare workers proves to some of the people in power that losing weight isn't realistic in many cases. But, ya know... as stubborn as people are when it comes to thinking about fat and weight loss... I can't say I'm hugely optimistic.
AGR - Yeah, those snippets of sanity in an insane world just aren't enough to encourage me that the powers that be are learning much about fatness and how alterable it isn't. It just makes no sense at all to blame people for being fat (even tho some fat people may have gotten that way from eating more than necessary) just like it makes no sense to blame someone for getting ovarian cancer or leukemia or having a heart attack or stroke (and even thin people who are supposedly healthy and doing all the right things get those diseases). This whole thing of making a person's health a matter of morality is senseless, but how to put a stop to it - well, I just don't know how to even begin to make that happen, and I don't think anyone else does either.
ReplyDelete