Along with messages on buying “antibiotic-free chicken” and “properties in Delhi and Gurgaon”, I also get a number of health SMSes almost every day. “Freedom from MRP Sale! Full Body Checkup worth Rs2500 @Rs720 + Rs50 OFF*… 45 Tests: HbA1c, Liver, Kidney, Lipid, CBC, Thyroid…,” said one, with a number I could call.
There are the fitness-related ones, which offer “annual discount” schemes (for ₹17,999 no less, and have the urgency of an HIIT workout: “Closing today rush or book call” said one, foregoing punctuation too.
“Suffering from recurring muscle/joint pain? Get help from the expert physiotherapists...” said another, pushing the services of allied healthcare pros.
Finally, to make sure I am really healthy, there are the calls from ‘Ayurvedic doctors’ who ask in a perfunctory manner if I have any ailment. I decided to test one out, and said I did: knee pain. He offered to send across a ‘kit’ of products I could apply and ingest, for ₹1,500.
The urgency of the messaging probably gets us to opt in. And while the marketing may not win a Cannes Lions Health & Wellness award, it obviously hooks people. It’s also a matter of convenience, gives us the impression that we’re getting value for our money, and offers solutions to problems we suddenly become conscious of.
While most of the ads (especially the ones on the back of autorickshaws about ending all our sexual problems) are dubious, their ‘here and now’ feel is not. Because we ignore the signs for far too long: a knee pain at 35 you live with because there’s school and office and a million things to be done; a strange discharge you pretend is normal (and no one can know about it); an allergy that’s been on through — wait a minute — life. It’s the little things that add incremental stress to our bodies, until they break down, and we get horrible diseases like diabetes, hypertension, or cancer.
I have had a book called The Asthma Cure by Tarika Ahuja for some months now. I’d read it the moment it arrived. I knew I needed to try the diet, the cornerstone of which is the avoidance of maida , sugar, dairy. Did I try it? Not until my asthma has really started acting up in the rainy season. If I didn’t have a battery of meds, would I be so blasé about it? Unlikely.
My indifference to my own health is appalling. Even more appalling is the fact that I need a shady ad to remind me that my tests are due, that I need to exercise regularly, that the pain in my knee is not normal. And that I should do something about it — now.
