Name: The Government’s obsession with making us healthy will be the death of me
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The Government’s obsession with making us healthy will be the death of me

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The problem with people is that they get ill, and that means they need medical care, which costs a lot of money&nbsp;and depends on a set of limited resources.In the UK, these resources are among the most squeezed in the West. and below France, the Netherlands&nbsp;and Germany, where an affordable compulsory insurance model allows for more resources available for the sick. France and Germany each have 1,000 more hospitals than the UK, with similar populations.We in Britain know all too well that ‘our’ NHS is constantly underfunded, often mismanaged, and sorely lacking in beds, space, nursing staff and doctors, who – overworked – are prone to strike. . The NHS is in dire straits, barely able to manage the deluge of the ill at the best of times. At present, Britain’s ability to meet Western standards of care hangs terrifyingly in the balance.And so, fired by the public health nightmare of Covid, the Government’s top-heavy attitude to the pleasures of our lives is steadily growing. Having taxed sugary drinks, made chains and businesses with more than 250 staff stick calorie&nbsp;counts on everything, and threatened to ban advertising of certain fatty foods – a remarkably authoritarian intervention into what remains of the free market – . The timing&nbsp;is appalling, coming just after the worst year ever for our poor pubs, which are barely getting back on their feet, and doing so amid a labyrinth of rules.Between our ageing population, , and now a backlog of untreated illness (at the start of the pandemic, many people preferred not to call an ambulance, resulting in numerous deaths at home, so as to avoid “troubling” the NHS), the Government has to lessen strain on the health system, whose structure it is mired in forever. This means, or so it thinks, that it has to make us healthier. If we keep eating and drinking too much, how will the health service cope?Trouble is, eating and drinking what one wants, without constant hassle and signage, is a pretty basic part of living in a minimally free society. But rather than let us decide for ourselves what we put in our gobs, the Government feels compelled to meddle. And meddle.Compared with other threats from our obesity-obsessed Government, calories on pints is relatively minor. As the Adam Smith Institute pointed out: “Everyone already knows if you put away a few jars a day you’re likely to get fatter.”But the&nbsp;latest idea is perfectly symbolic of the Government’s creeping treatment of us as walking biological threats, rather than human beings (and tax-paying ones at that). Because the NHS is in such a parlous state, the Government clearly feels that it has no choice but to tilt everything to the end of preserving it. So instead of getting off our back and letting us live our lives – lives that are necessarily some mixture of healthy and unhealthy; responsible and irresponsible; overindulgent and cautious – the state has come to see and treat us as bodies alone. Bodies engaged, if it has its way, in the full-time task of staving off decline, and therefore saving the NHS. The middle part of the lockdown slogan, ‘protect our NHS’, was the one that will stick, long after the pandemic has gone. I worry it is becoming a guiding principle for all that we do.And where does the obsession with making us healthy end? Once everything has been labelled and taxed, or banned, what then? Will we be ordered to exercise for a set time per day? Will we need to flash an app showing BMI and calories burned to gain access to supermarket sweet aisles (if they still exist) or pubs?Anything is possible, for the simple reason that the religion of the NHS runs deep, and the will to soldier on and save the system, and its heroes and martyrs, trumps all. Including ways that we might restructure healthcare in this country so that there is, bluntly, enough of it. Sadly, however, even the word ‘insurance’ can get you tossed out of almost any room in the land. Indeed, instead of demanding reform, we prefer to shoulder the burden of ‘our’ NHS emotionally, and to put up with interfering, dystopian intervention from a Government terrified of its collapse.If – beholden to our&nbsp;NHS – the Government continues to treat us not as grown-up citizens of a free land, but as walking time-bombs, bundles of fat molecules that must be stopped from detonating, people will begin to wither not from diabetes or heart disease but from a simple lack of joy. We may have saved our health service, but we won’t have a society worth being healthy for.What do you think of calorie labels on alcohol in pubs? Let us know in the comments below.Related TopicsThe Telegraph values your comments but kindly requests all posts are on topic, constructive and respectful. Please review our.You need to be a subscriber to join the conversation. 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The problem with people is that they get ill, and that means they need medical care, which costs a lot of money&nbsp;and depends on a set of limited resources.In the UK, these resources are among the most squeezed in the West. and below France, the Netherlands&nbsp;and Germany, where an affordable compulsory insurance model allows for more resources available for the sick. France and Germany each have 1,000 more hospitals than the UK, with similar populations.We in Britain know all too well that ‘our’ NHS is constantly underfunded, often mismanaged, and sorely lacking in beds, space,...

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Zoe Strimpel

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The Government’s obsession with making us healthy will be the death of me

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