Pay cuts for those who are aging, fat or have bad habits

As if we need another reason not to have our employer or the government in charge of our health or health insurance. No this isn’t another story from Europe, mandating screening and interventions for those who fail to measure up, this is from the United States:

As waists expand, paychecks may shrink

Do you smoke? Are you obese? Is your cholesterol out of control? In the coming years, workers at Indianapolis hospital system Clarian Health who answer yes to any of those questions could see their paychecks get smaller. In 2009, Clarian will begin charging workers up to $30 every two weeks for insurance if they let health risks such as smoking or high cholesterol go unchecked.

Clarian is not the only employer to use money as a motivator for employees to shape up.... companies increasingly are tracking not only their employees' productivity but also personal information such as their waistlines, blood pressure and cholesterol levels....But some programs, such as Clarian's, are moving beyond the honor system to mandatory health questionnaires and screenings....

Community Health Network, which began mandatory health screenings in 2005 for all employees receiving health benefits....

In 2004, Chris MacAllister, president of MacAllister Machinery Co. on the Eastside, set up a program that includes semi-annual health screenings in exchange for potential cash incentives. The screenings measure cholesterol, muscle flexibility, blood pressure, tobacco use and body mass index. Each employee and spouse can get up to $1,100 annually in cash incentives and health-insurance premium reductions if they meet certain health criteria, such as a total cholesterol level no more than 200, which generally is the cutoff for what's considered high. The healthier they are, the more money they get....

At insurance broker Gregory & Appel, employees can skip paying some health-insurance premiums for four to eight weeks if they go through health appraisals and screenings. They're asked questions about lifestyle and family history, and their cholesterol, blood sugar, weight and body mass index are tracked. If a problem is found, an employee has to accept a call from a wellness counselor in order to get the premium discounts, according to Sheri Alexander, senior vice president and manager of employee benefits....The company is considering making screenings a requirement for insurance coverage...

Given that health risk indices — from BMI, blood pressure, blood sugars to cholesterol — have been shown to be largely genetic and related to aging, and not significantly malleable with “healthful” lifestyles, how can this be anything but also thinly disguised age discrimination, lifestyle control and compulsory medication?