Where am I? 
Home Protection Medical
Categories: Medical
Topics: Friends Provident| survey| health| NHS/National Health Service
The NHS will have no choice but to remove some free treatment currently available and to penalise unhealthy behaviour, Friends Provident believes.
A Friends Provident report, Visions of Britain 2020, condemns Government health campaigns as 'failing' and predicts similar legislation to the smoking ban will be imposed to curb obesity.
Dr Sarah Brewer, Visions of Britain 2020 expert consulted for the report, says; "Something has to give. One scenario is that people may well end up being charged for certain treatments or denied certain non-essential treatment, particularly if their unhealthy lifestyle was a contributory factor. The other scenario is the withdrawal of many free treatments."
Treatments expected to no longer be free include: IVF and fertility treatment; Subsidised dental treatment; Obesity surgery and drugs; Dementia treatment and Complementary therapies.
Commenting,Trevor Matthews, chief executive officer of Friends Provident, says: "There will be a fundamental and permanent change in the provision of free healthcare in the next decade. The study identifies a disconnect between our aspirations for healthcare, and our behaviour. We all need to adopt healthier lifestyles or else risk being faced with penalties in the years ahead."
Experts and consumers agree unhealthy lifestyles should be penalised when it comes to treatment, with almost half (44%) supporting the introduction of a 'fat tax' and over a third (38%) agreeing that that NHS should not prioritise people who fail to look after their health.
| Share | |
| Comment | Friends Provident - NHS must charge for poor lifestyle choice |
More from cover
Email alerts
Recommended reading
Categories
Topics
Comments
choice
Lifestyle choice ? Who should have the right to say what lifestyle choice people make ? Smokers pay a huge amount of tax which not only helps pay for the NHS but also helps pay for non smokers treatment. How about the people that choose to drive? as we know traffic fumes help to kill everyone,should we ban driving as a lifestyle choice. It is time some common sense was shown.
Posted by: F Wilson
Who will play God ?
Who is to play God and decide which 'lifestyles' are not 'healthy' I smoke and pay a fortune in tax yet a person that engages in dangerous sports pays nothing. People walking in the street are living 'unhealthy' lifestyles due to the diesel fumes belched out hourly. Are they to be penalised because they decide to walk in the street ? Just because 'studies' show that practically everything we eat/drink/smoke are 'dangerous' why should we believe these self styled 'experts' as they usually have their own agenda and pocket to think of. Nicotine replacement, diet pills etc are big earners for the pharmaceutical companies and many 'experts' give out false information in the 'studies' in order to feather their own nests vis the drug company 'bribes' to state that certain lifestyles are dangerous. Let smokers tax be taken out of the Treasury and let the smokers that pay that tax use their taxes to pay for private medical care and very soon the NHS budget will be unable to pay for treatment for the 'healthy' amongst us.
Posted by: Jane
Related articles
Most Read
Audio / Visual
With the industry's biggest fund managers, IFAonline welcomes you to the media centre.
This year we have 14 awards designed to mark out the very best products in a highly competitive and innovative market. This includes three new awards for 2011 to reflect the developments in this rapidly growing market: Best Dual/Multi-Index Product, Best Structured (Oeic) Fund and Best Structured Product Provider.
Events
Poll
|
|
Job search
Ifaonlinejobs will open the right investment career path for you. Search hundreds of vacancies on www.ifaonlinejobs.co.uk now
In Focus
Transferring clients’ assets between organisations can be a major headache – often time...
Viewpoints
At the start of one of busiest times of year it is easy to think about all the obvious things...
sponsored by
NHS
The NHS is there to cater for rich and poor and we all pay for our care in one way or another.
Posted by: chas