Michael Fitzpatrick - Tyranny of Health Doctors and the Regulation of Lifestyle.pdf

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The.Tyranny.of.Health.Doctors.and.the.Regulation.of.Lifestyle.eBook-EEn
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THE TYRANNY OF HEALTH
Topical and controversial, The Tyranny of Health exposes the
dangers of the explosion of health awareness for both patients and
doctors, using straightforward language to explain the latest health
statistics and research findings.
Michael Fitzpatrick, a full-time inner-city GP, argues from his
day-to-day experience in the surgery that health propaganda is
having a very unhealthy effect upon the nation. Patients are made
unnecessarily anxious as a result of health scares which have greatly
exaggerated the risks of everyday activities such as eating beef,
sunbathing and having sex. Doctors no longer seem content with
treating disease but are encouraged by the government to tell people
how to live more and more aspects of their lives. Given the enormous
improvement in life expectancy over the past century, even the most
drastic changes in lifestyle are likely to have limited effect in further
prolonging life. A life of abstinence and vigilance may reduce your
risks of heart disease or cancer, but it is unlikely to delay your death
for more than a few months.
Recent NHS reforms in Britain are pushing doctors both to
play a wider role in regulating the behaviour of their patients and
to ration the allocation of resources to patient care. But people
need less nannying when they are well and more health care when
they are ill. Michael Fitzpatrick concludes that doctors should
stop trying to make people virtuous. He argues that we need to
establish a clear boundary between the worlds of medicine and
politics, so that doctors can concentrate on treating the sick—and
leave the well alone.
Michael Fitzpatrick is a General Practitioner working in
Hackney, London.
CONTENTS
Preface
vii
Glossary of acronyms
xii
1 Introduction
1
2 Health scares and moral panics
13
3 The regulation of lifestyle
35
4 Screening
55
5 The politics of health promotion
72
6 The expansion of health
96
7 The personal is the medical
118
8 The crisis of modern medicine
130
9 Conclusion
155
Bibliography
174
Index
188
v

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