Fat Chicks Rule

Incentive vs. Penality

A few jobs ago, I had health insurance from a company who would give me $100 if I went to the gym 50 times in 6 months. I took advantage of this 3 times, a strategy which allowed me to save $300 on my gym membership. Another job had a small on-site gym and free weekly yoga classes. Both of which I took advantage. Another place I worked had free fitness classes, walking groups, and nutrition lectures. My current health insurance company give me discounts on vitamins, gyms, massages, and yes even diet programs. 

These are incentives. I have an option of doing them or not. If I don't participate, I lose out only on free or inexpensive ways to make myself healthy. 

CVS drug stores have recently announced that all their employees must submit their weight, glucose levels, blood pressure, and body fat to a "third party" or face a penality of $600. 

This isn't an incentive. They aren't offering a free Amazon card for submitting, they are penalizing their employees for refusing to submit. 

“This is an incredibly coercive and invasive thing to ask employees to do,” said Patient Privacy Rights founder Dr. Deborah Peel, adding that mounting health care costs have made these policies increasingly common.

CVS responded that this is an incentive, and they don't plan to do anything with the information. They are merely concerned about the health of their employees.

Our initial request three years ago was that employees take a first step toward better health by getting a private health screening with the provider of their choice. But we realized many more people needed to participate. So this year, we made our incentive clearer, by letting employees know how much their premiums would go up if they didn't get screened. -- From CVS's facebook page March 20, 2013

Essentially if the employees don't get a "voluntary" health screen, they wouldn't get the incentive of not getting a penalty.

Huh?

I have to wonder why CVS has decided they need this information so badly they have to threaten their employees. Could this be a slippery slope of getting rid of people deemed "sick?" Considering that they've already told their smoking employees to quit smoking or be in a program (Which is amusing considering that CVS sells cigarettes.)

Smokers working for CVS are also warned: “You must either be tobacco-free by May 1, 2014, or participate in the WebMD tobacco cessation program.” Defiant smokers can avoid penalties if they are healthy enough in other categories specified by the company. 

I can almost see the fat employees who have to either become thin or enrolled in a weight loss plan. Next diabetics will have to control their sugar or else. Fuck genetics.   

I've decided to pull all my perscriptions from CVS over this. Please sign this petition to let CVS know not only is this not acceptable but we won't be using them until they change their policy. 

WLS isn't cheap

Lately there has been signs all over the NYC subway toting a weight loss surgery group that claims 6000 happy customers, virtually scarless and a happy man or woman who has lost 65 or so pounds and now is happy, dresses better and slender. Their website has nothing that I can find about long term success or side effects. All they have for pre-op is psychological evaluations and hints for post op nutrition. No mention of follow up surgeries, sepsis, malabsorption, and death. Not just from the surgery but WLS patients have a higher rate of suicide.

I know people who have WLS and the results so far have been good (or at least minimal side effects), bad and deadly. Shelley Bond of ASDAH posts about the illnesses she developed after WLS in her blog post here.

What sort of costs am I talking about just for me, who hasn’t had to have any subsequent surgeries or hospitalizations? Prior to surgery—and since my mid-20s—I’ve been treated for hypertension. Post-surgery, my blood pressure never really went down, and over the years my BP meds have changed and increased, all of which involved many doctor visits and medications.

I didn’t have diabetes at the time of surgery, but I developed it about a year ago, which surprised me: I didn’t know it was possible to get diabetes sometime after having WLS. This disease involves specialist visits every quarter, along with many fine drugs and monitors and testing strips. And diabetes comes with its own set of possible side effects which can be costly and life-changing, resulting in surgeries, hospitalizations and expensive medical equipment. Diabetes appears to be a pricey disease for the insured and the insurer.

I can't force a person not to do it, but I can write about the sham that this group touts to make it seem like WLS surgery is the simple and fun! I once heard a joke about fat people who get WLS as taking the easy way out. And I groaned. This surgery isn't easy.

In the nutrition section of the WLS group they talk about having to learn healthy eating to keep your weight loss. What they don't mention is that you will have to eat less because your body won't be able to handle it.

Being fat is often blamed for everything, all diseases, all high health care costs but if you want to talk about the bottom line for WLS, the only people getting richer are the surgeons, it's not only not dropping health care cost, in the long run it is going up. 

Surgical patients had lower healthcare costs in the first year after surgery, averaging about $1,000 lower per case, according to Jonathan P. Weiner, DrPH, of the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health, and co-authors. During the next 2 years, bariatric surgery was associated with significantly higher healthcare costs. In years 4 through 6, costs stabilized but remained higher in the surgery cohort for 2 of the 3 years.

So for those who have decided they wanted weight loss surgery please understand it isn't fluffy bunnies. It is a serious surgery on a major organ that can cause terrible side effects and death. And it requires serious life changes that you must always adhere to. 

 

Fighting fat is fighting fat people.

I have mentioned before that soda bans and taxes don’t affect me, since except for the rare root beer, I don't drink soda, diet or regular, large or small. I pretty much drink only water and tea. The only time I buy soda is the two parties I give every year. (And yes, because I love my friends, I even buy diet soda if they want it.) You wouldn't know that from some of the comments on my blog. According to the trolls, I don't exercise and I eat only chips, pizza and burgers. The issue is this. I often hear the statement "Fight fat, not fat people" by “well meaning” people who think that by saying hate the sin, not the sinner it absolves them from the pressure they put on fat people to become thin. However, since fat is genetic and losing it in the long run is near impossible for most people, how do you think fat people feel when they change habits, improve health outcomes and don't get thin? Do you still want to fight their fat? A recent study done by Harvard shows that while the majority of people want interventions in childhood “obesity”, they don't believe fat people should pay a surcharge for health insurance (that's a relief. That makes only food the villain and not health care.) Respondents were much more likely to support less-intrusive measures to curb obesity: 80 percent of those surveyed said the government should require calorie counts to be posted, 75 percent said they'd like the government to prevent the use of food stamps for soda and other sugary beverages, and 88 percent said they'd support requiring public school students to get at least 45 minutes of exercise daily. By contrast, more drastic measures were less widely supported: Nearly two-thirds said they'd oppose a $50 annual surcharge on health insurance premiums for obese people, 80 percent opposed making soda or junk food possession a punishable offense in schools... The issue here isn't healthy eating, the issue is that this is done solely because people are fat. It's our fault that you can't get a pitcher of soda with lunch; or your kids can't have pizza at school, or cupcakes for someones birthday party. Even if the whole world benefits in the long run, it's done because of us. It's our fault.  The problem is now that the meme of fatness equaling anti-health has been repeated so universally and so often, it might be impossible to separate them. That's not actually the case, though. While "the obesity epidemic" may be a convenient catch-all for the illnesses and health problems related to our food chain, it's a lazy term and an inaccurate one. Are we actually worried about public health? Or are we offended by fat bodies that don't meet our thin ideals? If the issue was that people in this country had horrendous eating and exercise habits but no one was fat, you wouldn’t see this. This is has nothing to do with ill health and everything to do with people being fat. This is why we need to stop associating health with thinness. We need to stop fighting fat and accept that people come in all sizes and that when they eat healthy and exercise they may not become thin.

Massachusetts wastes our time and money

Almost two years ago, I wrote about the absolute failure in Arkansas of BMI report cards. The program ended up wasting taxpayer money and it not only did not make fat kids thin, but there was no increase of healthy behaviors and even an increase in junk food.

So you would think that other states would learn the lesson of Arkansas, right? Wrong. Turns out Andover, Massachusetts is sending home "fat letters" to children:

They're being called "fat letters"-- notes mailed home from schools in North Andover, Mass., to alert parents that their child qualifies as obese.

"Honestly, I laughed," Tracy Watson, the mother of a fourth-grader who was the subject of one such letter, told the North Andover Patch.

Watson's son Cam is an active member on wrestling and football teams. But a screening by the school revealed that Cam's body mass index -- an indicator of body fat in relation to height and weight -- put him in the category of obese. The letter subsequently advised the Watsons to talk to their pediatrician.

It turns out the same kid mentioned in the above article just won the state championship:

Cameron, 10, now holds the state title in his weight class at 94 lbs. He went 3-0 and won the state title in Salem on Saturday by pinning his opponent in just under 30 seconds.

Andover, I am looking into my magic fat crystal ball. I'm seeing this as another waste of time and money AND I see it increasing eating disorders and dieting among your students.

The good news is the State is attempting to pass a law that prohibits the collection of children's BMI's. Mostly because they don't really tell you anything as for the kid who won the wrestling title.

NAAFA has put out a press release for his. If you live in MA especially Andover, please contact the people below.

Foster City, CA - NAAFA supports the passing of Massachusetts House Bill H.2024, legislation to prohibit the Department of Public Health from collecting data on students relative to height, weight and body mass indexes.

In 2009, the Massachusetts Department of Public Health adopted a "BMI initiative" requiring public schools to calculate the BMI of children and teens of certain ages and to send the results to the children's parents along with advice for parents on how to deal with the child's weight issues.

H.2024 seeks to amend Section 1, Chapter 71 of the General Laws by inserting the following language: "(h): No language in this section shall authorize the Department of Public Health to collect data on height, weight, or calculate a student's Body Mass Index."

Children whose parents were told they were overweight were no more likely to have lost weight than children whose parents were not notified according to the School-Based Body Mass Index Screening and Parent Notification study. The findings were based on data from nearly 7 million children.

The focus on overweight and obesity has led to increases in body dissatisfaction in children as young as six years of age. Lower body satisfaction does not serve as a motivator for engaging in healthy weight management behaviors, but rather predicts the use of behaviors that may place adolescents at risk for weight gain and poorer overall health according to the study, Does body satisfaction matter?

CALL TO ACTION:

NAAFA encourages its members and all concerned residents of Massachusetts to write to or call Governor Deval Patrick as well as committee heads, State Senator John Keenan and State Representative Jeffrey Sanchez, and the Department of Public Health in support of the passing of H.2024. Letters and phone calls of support should be directed to:

Governor Deval Patrick
Massachusetts State House
Room 280
Boston, MA 02133
617-725-4005

Lauren Smith, MD, MPH
Interim Commissioner
Massachusetts Department of Public Health
250 Washington Street
Boston, MA 02108
617-624-6000

State Senator John Keenan
Senate Committee on Public Health Chair
Massachusetts State House
Room 504
Boston, MA 02133
617-722-1494

State Representative Jeffrey Sanchez
House Committee on Public Health Chair
Massachusetts State House
Room 130
Boston, MA 02133
617-722-2130