A new government app – to save the NHS and make you slim!

 

As if the pingdemic weren’t bad enough – the latest news from the ping-front is that TfL is closing the Circle Line and the Hammersmith Line for the whole weekend because: ‘Ping’! – there’s a new app being developed, to drive the BJ ‘anti-fat’ campaign. On the surface it might look hilarious, but it is yet another sign that the people ‘at the top’ have learned well from the testdemic and pingdemic: the majority of our nation is happy to be ruled by algorithms, may they be ever so idiotic. They’re happy to let apps govern their lives.

It’s magic how this works: publish a ’scare’ report while en coulisse ‘pilot schemes’ to alleviate that ‘scare’ are already far advanced. Last week BJ’s ‘food tsar’ – Mr Henry Dimbleby who is indeed one of that BBC Dimbleby clan – produced a report on how to combat fatness, oh, sorry: obesity, with the beloved instrument of any state: moar tax:

“The report proposed a new tax of £3 per kilogram on sugar and £6 per kilogram on salt sold wholesale for use in processed foods, or in restaurants and catering businesses.The ‘snack tax’ would see 87p added to a box of Kellogg’s Frosties and 63p added to a jar of Bonne Maman Raspberry Conserve.” (link)

BJ, standing up for “Teh Poor” who like sweets didn’t think this was a good idea, so he’s come up with a better one: a ‘reward scheme’, to be run by, yes indeed, an app:

“Boris Johnson is to launch a government-backed rewards programme for families switching to healthier food and exercising under radical plans to tackle Britain’s obesity crisis. The scheme will monitor family supermarket spending, rewarding those who reduce their calorie intake and buy more fruit and vegetables. People increasing their exercise by taking part in organised events or walking to school will also accumulate extra “points” in a new app.” (paywalled link)

Well, the nation’s fatness has been worrying the NHS for some time, and clearly, something must be done because saving and protecting the NHS has become this nation’s be-all and end-all. This app ‘reward scheme’  has already advanced sufficiently far enough:

“The scheme is to be launched in January and underlines Mr Johnson’s determination to tackle growing levels of obesity. […] A Whitehall source said: “There is a whole team in Downing Street working on this, and the Prime Minister thinks that we simply cannot go on as before and that we must now tackle it head on.” (paywalled link)

Words failed me when I saw that a ’whole team in No 10’ is working on this – do we not have other problems, perhaps the one dealing with the pingdemic? Clearly, this ‘team’ as well as Bj are totally oblivious to the unintended consequences such apps produce! Ah, but fatness is terrible for the NHS, and this government’s main aim is to ‘save and protect’ you-know-what.

Here’s proof if more were needed. Lord Stevens was the Chief of NHS England, responsible for all NHS disasters that happened when covid started last year. He stood down in April this year and was rewarded with being made a ‘Lord’. In an interview with the FT

“he suggested Britons’ lifestyles needed a major overhaul, saying: “The layers of the onion… stretch out to things that are obviously beyond a healthcare system’s direct control, including the obesogenic food environment that children and poorer communities are exposed to. Countries where more than half the population are overweight have had 10 times more Covid deaths.” (paywalled link)

‘Obesogenic food environment’? Huh – I’ve not heard that before. Note however that it’s actually about a lack of control, ‘direct NHS control’. Note that yet another chum belonging to the top layer of the Westminster cabal is going to ‘run the scheme’, Sir Keith Mills. Note finally that this whole thing is already so far advanced that:

“Earlier this month, the Government issued a tender for the £6 million pilot, and around 40 firms are understood to have shown interest. Details of the first pilots are yet to be agreed but are likely to focus on surveillance of diet and exercise habits, with hopes that an app can be rolled out nationally.” (paywalled link)

I hope you noticed the word ‘surveillance’. I hope you noticed the word ‘app’. It seems the NHS T&T and ‘Ping’ apps are the real-life examples on which this scheme will be modelled – what could go wrong, after all! Now look at this:

“Pilot schemes will examine how best to incentivise families to make changes to their diet and exercise habits.  Companies such as Capita and Serco are understood to be among those bidding for contracts, with the first pilot likely to be run across a whole city.” (paywalled link)

Clearly this is going to become another nice little earner, just as the T&T scheme has produced huge profits for all involved in the making and running of the tests – all in the name of  protecting ‘our health’ – the covid lemmings have already shown that they submit to apps. It’s beyond belief that no-one in that No 10 anti-obesity team is even raising the slightest doubt about what they are proposing:

“The programme – modelled on schemes tried in Singapore – is likely to first trial an app allowing people to scan in their weekly shop and track their activity levels. Officials are considering going still further, with rewards linked to compliance with NHS checks, such as undergoing a smear, mammogram or health MOT.” (paywalled link)

Well, at least it’s not modelled on China! And thus we’re being nudged into a surveillance state – a state run for the benefit of the Sacred Cow. We pay for this Cow with our taxes, we’ve been ‘protecting’ it during the covid outbreaks, we’re still protecting it by submitting to the T&T and ‘Ping’ NHS apps. Obviously, “we” are deemed to be ripe for more surveillance and more coercion, all in the name of protecting that Cow. 

Our fatness and fat-related illnesses cost the Cow £6bn a year. Our fatness is the reason for the covid death rates – all according to figures coming from that Cow. And yes indeed – “we” could save the Cow “£100 million if everyone who was overweight lost at least 5lbs.” And just think of the savings if fat people were to lose 10, 20 or 30lbs!

From T & T and “Ping!” to the surveillance of private decisions about what to eat – who’d have thought two years ago when BJ was elevated to Tory Party leader how easily we’d slide into a nation accepting coercion and surveillance, in the name of saving that Cow! After all, the covid months have shown that we accept to be ruled by apps. Will the next step be an app connecting to your banking app, telling it not to pay for ‘bad food’?

All I’ll say is: ditch that smartphone now! 

 

 

Photo by Sean MacEntee

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