Smoking and Obesity: Cost to NHS

HL Deb 18 November 2004 vol 666 cc220-1WA

Lord Glentoran

asked Her Majesty's Government:

Further to the Answer by the Lord Warner on 9 November (HL Deb, col. 750), whether obesity or smoking costs the National Health Service more. [HL4968]

Lord Warner

In the 1998 White Paper,Smoking Kills, it was estimated that the cost of treating illness and disease caused by smoking cost the National Health Service up to £1.7 billion a year.

The National Audit Office report, Tackling Obesity in England, published in 2001, estimated that the direct cost to the NHS of treating obesity and its consequences in 1998 was £480 million. As part of its inquiry into obesity, the Health Select Committee estimated that in 2002 the direct cost to the NHS was between £990 million and £1,225 million.