Pay people to be healthy, say NICE advisors
pharmafile | September 28, 2010 | News story | | NHS, NICE, public health
The NHS should use financial incentives to encourage people to make healthier lifestyle changes, according to NICE’s Citizen’s Council.
The advisory group is made up of members of the public and helps NICE to test public opinion on potentially controversial issues.
Twenty of the Council’s 32 members (63%) voted in favour of incentive schemes, provided a number of conditions were in place, such as monitoring participants’ progress and analysing the schemes’ relative effectiveness.
A number of small-scale pilots have already been run in the UK that include offering pregnant women supermarket vouchers if they stop smoking and rewarding children with toys if they eat more fruit and vegetables, but the approach is not commonly used to improve public health
Sir Michael Rawlins, chairman of NICE, said: “The Citizens’ Council makes an important contribution to the work of NICE by providing a snapshot of what the general public thinks about controversial health challenges.
“Their views do not constitute formal guidance, but they do advise us about the social values that should underpin our work.”
The Council members agreed that incentive schemes are likely to work best when they are targeted and used as part of a wider programme of support.
They should also acknowledge the complex factors that motivate people to put their health at risk, such as by excessive eating or drinking, drug-taking, a lack of exercise or smoking.
The 12 Council members who voted against the use of incentives did so for reasons including uncertainty over their long term benefits due to a lack of evidence, their potential for abuse, their cost, and because of their perceived unfairness towards people who are able to live healthy lives without them.
Rawlins said NICE was now “very keen” to hear what the general public thinks about the Council’s conclusions.
If such scheme were rolled out on a national scale, and proved effective, the NHS could potentially save billions in the long term by reducing incidences of chronic diseases such as cancer and diabetes.
Such avoidable health problems are costly to the NHS: smoking causes 90% of all lung cancers that require expensive and specialist care and the UK is now Europe’s most obese country, which can lead to myriad long-term health problems including heart disease, diabetes and cancer.
Ben Adams
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