Safeway in the US has introduced a new workplace wellness program for 2009 called Healthy Measures. The unique thing about this program is that it gives individual employees more control of their health dollars by putting a focus on prevention more than treatment. In the US many companies offer their employees health insurance as part of their work contracts, however several US companies now want to look at rewarding those staff who maintain good health, as this ultimately reduce health treatment costs.

In the Safeway program, employees will be financially rewarded if they can control their smoking, obesity, BP and cholesterol. The reason that these health parameters were chosen was because 70% of Safeway’s health-care costs were linked to these factors.

Additionally, the company is also offering employees access to a local fitness centre, as well as offering free or subsidised lunches at the company cafeteria which focuses on healthy and calorie controlled meals.