Should the NHS stop spending so much money trying to 'help' people who WON'T be helped?

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I don't want to be too specific, but I work in the public sector, and in health (and have done for the last 10 years or so).

I'm getting increasingly frustrated and demotivated by the huge amount of taxpayers money which is poured into activities which are designed to 'reduce health inequalities' i.e. improve the health of people in deprived & disadvantaged areas or 'Tackle Obesity'
The latest attempt is a national programme called 'Change for Life' which is trying to get parents to make small chnages for the overall benefit of their family's health.

Now, I know the NHS & Govt can be responsible for some crap ideas, but there are some half decent ones out there too. In the last few years there have been lots of attempts to make things easier for people to do - to stop smoking ot lose weight for example.

However so many of the people we are trying to help are just so downright bolshy, unmotivated and disinterested in taking any action to improve any aspect of their personal health, that I'm now beginning to just think "WTF? Why not just bypass this generation (or 2) and focus on children and future generations"

Do you think we have a moral obligation to at least attempt to make people healthier??

Why do people simply not care about their health? Can they really not see the consequences of their current lifestyles?

maybe we should just shoot the poor and uneducated then

You have to understand that alot of people who are 'poor' have erm, no money.....so they do simple things with basic food to make their life easier. They do not do it on purpose

They buy a bag of potatoes and chip them because they are working split shifts from one another, potatoes are relatively cheap if you buy a large locally produced bag and they taste nice.

I think the whole scenario is obviosuly more complex than i have painted it but that is one of the reasons why

Have been thinking a bit more specifically about your original questions.

Do you think we have a moral obligation to at least attempt to make people healthier?? - Yes I do. We should attempt to make people healthier but the help needs to be practical rather than just lecturing. Have more community sports facilities and make them free. Link them in with other community stuff and make them places that everyone knows about and can get to very very easily. All that stuff Highlander said.

Why do people simply not care about their health? Can they really not see the consequences of their current lifestyles? Because they think it won't happen to them. The short-term pleasures of unhealthy food, fags and alcohol are too tempting to be outweighed by possible problems later down the line. Because once it's started to go wrong it feels to hard to change. Because if evryone around you is unhealthy you think it's fairly normal and inevitable.

I am really against the idea of restricting access to service for lifestyle reasons personally. Yes someone might be a fat lazy slob but it doesn't mean you can just leave them to suffer and not try to help.

But how long do you try for?
When do you decide that the money is better spent helping someone who has given the slightest inkling of a hint that they are willing to make some effort themselves?

" willing to make some effort themselves"

is an over exageration. Have you got any statistics to base your claims on that people cannot change?

I know plenty of people who have their nhs smoking cessation certificates up in their house FRAMED. I know it is hard to believe, but it is true.

The get active groups are always successful aswell.

Maybe instead of getting angry with the nhs it would be better placed to support early years groups like sure start etc that start early on food understanding/knowledge etc

People cannot help being poor

You keep trying and trying. You can't give up on people. No matter how hopeless cases they seem to be. And even if they take the help and chuck it back in your face.

When you start choosing who deserves treatment and who doesn't you are on a very very slippery slope IMO.

Tinned Ham - I think you're misunderstanding my original posts.

I work with the NHS. My overarching feeling is one of frustration that so many services and opportunities are offered, but not taken up.

I'm not bashing the poor at all. Agree about SureStart etc.

its a cultural thing. smoking, brinking kebabs

education helps to perpetuate a diferent norm.

i can't tell you how many paretns i have heard say " i stopped smoking becuase little jimmy had a lesson at school and told me he didn't want me to die"

I don't know though - drinking smoking and eating kebabs aren't activites limited to poorly educated people by any means.

Maybe there is a difference in doing things in moderation.

Maybe when people don't work they have more time to indulge bad habits? I know since I have been off work with DD I am eating much more badly, downing litres of fizzy drinks etc.

When you don't work you can more afford to have a hangover so you drink more?

I don't know, I just think that for many of us we make better choices not because we want to for us, but because external pressures make us moderate our habits and conform to certain norms.

Which I suppose also links into the cultural norms thing that custardo talks about.

well, that's one way to avoid the pension crisis.