Paying -- or not -- to keep fat off in the future
While we're all talking about how -- and how much -- to pay for medical care, here's one more item to chew on. If obesity can be caused by a virus, then it might also be prevented with a vaccine. And if a company ever develops one, imagine that marketing campaign. And the fight over how much the vaccine should cost, and who should pay for it.
Of course, the cost-savings in the long-term could be enormous.
-Greg Dahlmann
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How much are we willing to bet that an "obesity vaccine" will be approved in record time, made affordable, and added to every child's shot regimen... even as the HPV vaccine continues to be stymied by moralists?
Of course, having the backing of and funding from the fast food industry won't hurt.
- by Sabrina on Aug 29, 2007 at 11:12 AM | link
It is highly unlikely that is virus plays more than a small role in most cases of obesity anyway. And a psychoactive chemical that cut obesity would not be covered due to judgements that people "should" use willpower where a behavioral mechanism is implicated, even when they clearly can't (very few people are willfully choosing to be obese).
- by emily on Aug 29, 2007 at 1:43 PM | link
If this did ever materialize, it would probably end up in the same place as the car that runs on water, or the car tires that last 500,000 miles. There is too much money on both sides of the obesity market to ever let this happen. If by some miracle it made it to the market, you better believe that big pharma would maximize their profits.
- by Cary on Aug 29, 2007 at 6:16 PM | link
Besides which, the idea of an obesity vaccine moves very clearly backwards so far as research goes - research which shows obesity has a wide range of causes. Much like trying to put together a large jigsaw puzzle, there is no one clear cause or reason for obesity - we see pieces of the puzzle as its being put together: genetics, willpower, prenatal care, illness, injury, and so on and so forth.
The notion of a single cause for an illness/disease seems as outmoded as the notion that a single gene will be responsible for a single problem. While it can happen, the reality tends to be much more diverse.
We do a disservice to focus on single cause/cure models for illness, be it obesity or anything else. Likewise, when we don't use care in our language when we discuss issues of disease/illness - when we talk about cures for people who might not be looking for one - we contribute to the very stigmatizing social situations that exist, and in theory one would hope bioethicists would be attempting to reduce, rather than reinforce.
- by Kelly on Aug 29, 2007 at 11:30 PM | link
Kelly makes a lot of good points. I think it would be interesting to see how the general public would react if such a vaccine was ever developed and marketed. As Kelly pointed out, obesity is almost without a doubt a multi-factorial condition. Even if a viral infection does play some role -- and it could be prevented -- there are still all the other players. To what extent should the maker of this potential vaccine be responsible for educating people about the whole story? And how willing would the public be to process that complicated message? We tend to like things quick and simple.
- by Greg on Aug 30, 2007 at 1:51 AM | link