Struggles
I have been feeling like my title 'how are the obese victimised in society' is far too vague; I don't want to be in a similar situation to last year where my essay title is so open ended that I have no idea where on earth I am going with it.
I had a thought about what I am actually interested in and what I want to find out more about. As a nation, we all depend on the NHS providing us with the best quality care and treatment when we are unwell. Without this some of us would not be able to afford the services that they provide, which in some cases could be life threatening. Therefore I have decided to flip the question on its head a little and try to focus more on how the NHS can survive in the current financial climate with the help of the attitude and behaviour of the nation contributing in a more positive way.
I have decided to alter my title to(no doubt this will change again) 'would the NHS be more cost efficient if the government were to subsidise more valuable health education?'
This way I feel like I have a question to answer rather than just pushing some opinions on a very open ended statement about the obese.
Things I want to discuss in my essay
- Child educational development, as children grow up they need to know what is good and bad for you. If they learn fundamental information at a young age they will develop as values for the rest of their lives
- How this generation has been so affected by the development of technology, how this has lead to some poor lifestyle factors
- SUGAR (inspired by 'Jamie's sugar rush')How much money is spent on treating type two diabetes
- Cuts in the NHS, how they will be affect people in different ways
References (so far)
ADVERTISING
- 'Critics portray advertising as a socially pointless attempt to capture market share through psychological manipulation' (Stegeman,M (1991)Advertising in competitive markets, the American Economic Review vol.81, No.1 p210-223)
BEHAVIOUR
- 'Like many risk factors for disease, obesity results from behaviour and shows a social gradient. Especially among women, obesity is more common among lower income individuals, less education and some ethnic/racial minorities' (Alder,N,Stewart,J (2009)The Milbank Quarterly vol.87, No.1 p47-70)
- 'The number of obese or overweight people in developing countries rose from 250 million to almost one billion in under three decades, and these rates are rising significantly faster than in rich nations'
I definitely need some more, but I am struggling to find them as this is such a current issue only specific to the UK. I will speak to my tutor in the next session to gain some advice on where to look for some effective academic references.
ESSAY PLAN
ESSAY PLAN
Introduction
- How much our nation depends upon the NHS-emphasise health and wellbeing importance
- Outline current issues of spending, debt and any other external government issues
- What I want to ultimately find out; is there enough evidence there to prove that improving education will have a more positive impact on our lifestyle choices and therefore health.
- How much danger the younger generation is in today being surrounded by all of these corruptions
Paragraph One: Government spending cuts, how has this affected the NHS so far? (outlining the current position of the NHS)
- The whole country is in debt, constantly trying to cut back which means it is inevitable that certain groups of people will be affected not just in terms of health (this is the route of the problem)
Paragraph Two: How problems in society are not contributing to our wellbeing
- Society has become extremely lazy, narcissistic and isolated since the development of technology and social media. Evidence suggests that level of wellbeing has declined ever since with the rise of cyber bullying etc.
- People are in a competition to be the best CONSTANTLY- vulnerable and insecure
- We need to make ourselves aware of these consequences, this could work through shock tactics e.g. calculating the time spend using our phone on a large scale=time wasted
Paragraph Three: Food industry and big companies power
- Manipulation of the vulnerable through advertising
- Placing of products in stores
- Food labelling
- We need to be properly educated about nutritional values in food, maybe one good thing is that the younger generation will be familiar with the traffic light system and vaguely familiar with balanced diets, but different types of fats etc and how damaging they are.
- Talk about domestic sciences being scrapped, how this has had a negative impact on our life skills, need to be taught how to cook!!
Paragraph Four: Avoidable health conditions
- Leading on to obesity and related health conditions; heart disease and diabetes
- How much the NHS spends on diabetes; where else could this money go?
- What is being done already- talk about tax on sugary drinks
- Also how much the NHS spends on tooth extraction
- Smoking cessation
- If more emphasis was put on how serious the consequences are for making these life choices then people may choose to make alternative choices.
- Exercise should be emphasised in schools, especially with further education e.g. compulsory sports classes on Wednesdays being scrapped
Conclusion
- Not enough importance is being put on our individual wellbeing which is creating a viscous cycle with current pressures in society, including too much pressure being put on NHS staff with having to over work for less pay due to government cuts.
- If more money was put into educating todays younger generation about the negative consequences that making poor lifestyle choices can have both individually and on society then the changes in NHS spending on ‘avoidable’ conditions will become evident
- Money can be spent in more valuable areas elsewhere
RESEARCH TO DO (ASAP)
- More academic references
- Government spending on education
- Government cuts on the NHS
- NHS spending on inadequate areas
- How care has suffered due to lack of resources
- How much obesity has risen in the last few decades
- What are the biggest health concerns in the UK right now
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