August 11, 2021 — Normal and healthy are tricky words. They provide a reference point but at the same time they have the potential to alienate people. Pressure to conform pushes against a desire for acceptance. The culture imposes ideas about sizes and shapes of bodies that are normal or healthy. From this pressure, weight bias emerges. It is […]
August 10, 2021 — We have food systems that have done a fine job of meeting goals to provide abundant quantities of nourishment. But there is broad agreement that this abundant food supply has fueled global growth in obesity. So the question becomes what to do about it. Can we fix food systems by shifting from a mission to […]
August 9, 2021 — Could it be that innovation and competition for better obesity care will overtake the health problem of obesity? We see several signs pointing to this. A decade ago, it was tough to get FDA to take obesity innovation seriously. So big pharma research was running from the challenge. Sanofi had invested heavily in developing rimonabant […]
August 8, 2021 — Anger is circulating freely these days. It’s nothing new. But harnessing anger and its close cousin – fear – is a skill social media algorithms seem to have mastered. Thus, politicians see an opportunity and anger grows. Punitive public policy scores points with constituents stoked by anger and fear. It seldom solves problems, though. In […]
August 7, 2021 — Obesity can be very real problem for women who want to have a baby. First of all, it can interfere with getting pregnant. Even when pregnancy becomes a reality, obesity can lead to problems. Preeclampsia, gestational diabetes, postpartum hemorrhage, cesarean delivery, excess fetal growth, stillbirth, congenital anomalies, and neonatal death are all more frequent issues […]
August 6, 2021 — It is a jarring headline. U.S. health systems cost the most and perform the worst in comparison to ten other wealthy countries. In fact, the comparison is not even close. So what does it mean to be dead last in healthcare? Norway, the Netherlands, and Australia have the top performing health systems. The list also […]
August 5, 2021 — Taking dietary advice from headlines is an iffy proposition. Today many headlines are telling us to eat more foods from plants and we’ll have less heart disease. The basis for this claim is two new studies in JAHA. The American Heart Association is pretty clear about the message it wants to send. Its press release […]
August 4, 2021 — Bariatric surgery provides a benefit for reducing risks to heart health. This has been pretty clear for years now. Still, utilization remains low because the procedure seems daunting to many who need it. But a recent study suggests that an anti-obesity medicine – orlistat – might also reduce risks to heart health. In the European […]
August 3, 2021 — People are fond of saying you can’t outrun a bad diet. Taking that catchphrase to a more positive track, a new study in Circulation tells us that running to a better diet can deliver better heart health. The study showed the effects a healthy diet with a modest calorie reduction combined with moderate exercise. This […]
August 2, 2021 — We see a lot of stubborn opinions about nutrition and obesity research. People dig intellectual trenches and defend their positions about sugar, salt, and fat. Suppositions turn into convictions. Data becomes a tool for proving a point. Or inconvenient data leads a professor say we have to stomp it out. It’s depressing, really, if we […]
