Archive for September, 2021

Obesity and Stigma: The War Inside Your Head

September 30, 2021 — The “War on Obesity” has claimed many victims, but made little progress against the disease itself. This  approach to obesity has done a fine job of setting up a war inside our own heads – self-stigma. “Weight stigma is widespread, damaging and difficult to eradicate,” writes Rebecca Puhl in the Washington Post. In fact, the […]

Bariatric Surgery in Children as Well as Teens

September 29, 2021 — As severe obesity has grown to take a toll on a growing number of children and teens, clinical care is evolving. In 2019, the American Academy of Pediatrics said it plainly. Youth with severe obesity need better access to bariatric surgery. The authors of that position statement conceded that most of the young patients for […]

Barriers to Overcoming Obesity: Lack of Coverage

September 28, 2021 — Ample medical evidence supports the fact that obesity is a complex, chronic, relapsing disease. Yet somehow it remains a subject of hot debates in the medical community, not to mention society at large. When it comes to treating obesity with medication, numerous insurers rely on the opinions of committees to determine which medications to cover. […]

A Spark of New Life for Bimagrumab in Obesity

September 27, 2021 — It was an exciting possibility. At ObesityWeek 2019, Novartis scientist Laura Coleman presented fascinating results for an experimental drug, bimagumide, in obesity. In a phase 2 study, it yielded impressive improvements in body composition for people with obesity. It wasn’t just making people lose body fat. It helped them also gain muscle mass. Then, it […]

Blame and Shame at Odds with Trust and Health

September 26, 2021 — Some learning comes only the hard way. In this pandemic, we see some countries cope well while others struggle. In the process, we can learn a great deal on many fronts. But the case study of Denmark is offering an especially vivid lesson in the value of avoiding blame and shame while building of trust […]

Limited Booster Approval? Not Exactly

September 24, 2021 — Limited approval . . . heated debate . . . setback for booster plans. The pathway to rolling out booster shots has been torturous, for sure. But let’s be clear. As the dust clears, the approval of booster shots for the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine is hardly limited. Everyone over 65 can get it. Under 65, the […]

Serious Questions About Saturated Fat Guidance

September 24, 2021 — Julia Child may have had it right. Way back in 1990, she had serious questions about dietary guidance to avoid saturated fat. At a food event in 1990, she described the response to her renowned cooking: “I hear them saying, ‘Here comes Julia, with all the cream and butter.’ “Everybody is overreacting. If fear of […]

Why Is Dietary Advice Stuck on Low-Fat Dairy?

September 23, 2021 — It’s amazing how strong the biases about dairy foods can be. In the process of developing the 2020 dietary guidelines, it came up over and over again. Negative sentiment about dairy was one of the top themes in public comments. One bias is a visceral disdain for dairy foods in any form. Some people cannot […]

Only Words? Words Shape Reality for Better or Worse

September 22, 2021 — We have an opportunity before us, say Thiago Gagliano-Jucá and Caroline Apovian. They are writing in Annals of Internal Medicine to reflect on the implications of words we use in healthcare. Specifically, they are talking about the words providers attach to obesity – words like morbid. These are words that leave patients feeling judged. Such […]

Forget Weight? Focus on It? Or Meet in the Middle?

September 21, 2021 — To say that our culture obsesses about weight and body image is possibly an understatement. Athleisure togs serve to emphasize it. People dress to look like they’re going for a run, to the gym, or a yoga class. And yet, this obsession divides us. Two new publications today offer a sharp contrast on this subject. […]