The art of the wellness scam

Forget the “art of the deal.” Look to the “art of the scam.”

Here is an especially artful one, meriting praise from consummate deal-makers.

Consider “wellness.” We don’t need a Ponce de Leon elixir to bolster our health. We need to give thanks for the healthy genes we inherited. We need to obey the easy maxims: wear seat belts, don’t exceed the highway speed limits, get vaccinated against whatever is endemic, wash our hands. And the difficult maxims: cut the calories, up the exercise, axe the cigarettes (as well as the drugs). Limit alcohol; and, if we don’t, then stay out of the drivers’ seats. We should take medications to lower blood pressure and cholesterol (after we’ve lost weight and started exercising). If we have a chronic disease, such as diabetes, we should follow the regimen. There is no arcane secret in these prescriptions.

Yet scamsters have made “wellness” into a marketable product – in the words of a noted deal-maker, “wellness” is a “fantastic” deal.

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A deal, as well as a scam, needs two or more parties, who all expect to benefit.

On one side, employers want healthy employees. More specifically, they want to see less absenteeism, less days lost to illness, higher productivity – in short, lower workforce costs. Presumably, healthier employees will meet these goals.

As for employees, they may not care whether their employers’ costs fall. But presumably they would like to be “healthier.”

The genius of this scam lies in the packaging. Why not package “employee wellness” into a program, then peddle it? At first blush, the notion is perfect: employers will gain a “better” workforce, employees will gain enhanced well-being, and of course the “wellness” company will profit.

An $8 billion “wellness” industry has popped up. Typically a program employee, maybe a nurse, will assess health, monitor weight, cholesterol and blood pressure, urge exercise, and offer “incentives” to employees, encouraging them to meet “healthy” guidelines (generally, lose weight). Seventy percent of large employers offer a program.

For employers, the “wellness” program constitutes a line item; but, whether or not the total labor costs rise or fall, that cost is immaterial.

The programs deflect the possible role of employers in bolstering employees’ health. For healthier employees, employers could discard the brutal boss, who bolsters employee stress, but does not increase productivity.

Next, employers could: make the workplaces healthier by obeying OSHA regulations, instead of resisting them; guarantee comprehensive affordable family health insurance coverage to all, even part-time workers; provide paid family and medical leave, so workers could take care of themselves and relatives; provide sufficient paid vacation time for employees to engage in recreation; provide sufficient lunch and breaks for employees to eat all that nutritious fruit; pay lowest-level employees much more than the minimum wage.

All these cost more than a “wellness” program. Yet all these could bolster their workers’ health. •

Joan Retsinas is a columnist for The Progressive Populist and contributing writer for Aging Today.

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