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The personal responsibility brigade will be going ape over Pharmac looking into funding weight loss drugs.

This wouldn’t be for anyone wanting to lose a few kilos here and there. This would be for people who are obese and at risk of serious health complications. Around 200 potentially serious health complications, actually. Such as Type 2 Diabetes.  

I think it’s a no-brainer. Because we have the third-highest adult obesity rate in the OECD, which is a problem for all of us.

Even those of us with the metabolism of a racehorse. Because, with the health complications that come with obesity, we all end up paying.

Whether it be in a financial sense as taxpayers or as users of the health system seeing waiting times blow out because of the demand for treatment. Because of the impact of obesity on the health system.

The fact that Pharmac is even considering giving these weight loss drugs the time of day is brilliant. It now needs to ignore the naysayers and get on with it.

And there will be naysayers. The people in the personal responsibility brigade who look at every overweight person and think they’ve got no control.

You know: “They’re all just a bunch of lardies who eat KFC every day. And why the hell should us taxpayers pay for that lot to get a magic potion because they can’t say no. Because they’ve got no self-control. Haven’t they heard of personal responsibility?” Blah blah blah. 

The funny thing is, you don’t hear this lot ripping-into people with high blood pressure. Or people with heart disease. Or even people with cancer.

You don’t hear the personal responsibility crew saying those people shouldn’t be on Pharmac’s funding list. Because, if you apply the logic they apply to obese people, the exact same thing could be said.

That someone who smokes, for example, shouldn’t get their blood pressure pills funded by the taxpayer or someone who smokes and gets cancer shouldn’t get medications that might save or extend their life. 

Obesity is a disease just like any other disease. A disease people have because of genetics or hormonal issues or psychological issues. It’s way more complicated than just how much food someone eats.

Which is why we need to accept that, if these drugs are a genuine option for people who have no way of losing significant amounts of weight and no other way of avoiding serious conditions like Type 2 Diabetes, then why wouldn’t we fund weight loss drugs for them?

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