Archive for October, 2021

For Teens with Obesity, COVID Vaccines Save Lives

October 21, 2021 — A new report in MMWR this week provides a stark reminder. COVID vaccines save lives – especially for teens with obesity and other medical conditions. The study analyzed 464 patients 12 to 18 years old. Of those, 179 were hospitalized with COVID-19 and 285 were case controls. Nearly three quarters (72 percent) of these patients […]

Tirzepatide Shows Good Weight Outcomes in Diabetes

October 20, 2021 — Day by day, the prospects for treating obesity are getting better. Late on Monday, detailed results from the longest study yet of tirzepatide came out in Lancet. This was a study using this new drug in people with type 2 diabetes, but the average BMI of these patients was 33. None of them had a […]

FNCE: The Challenge to Put Health First Over Weight

October 19, 2021 — FNCE is winding up today after four days of this virtual conference. For information on weight, health, and obesity, the agenda offered some bright spots – most especially content on the lived experience of obesity. But one subject was almost completely absent. Rigorous discussion about weight neutral care, including Health at Every Size, could not […]

FNCE: Starting with Lived Experience in Obesity Care

October 18, 2021 — All too often, the healthcare experiences of people living with obesity are appalling. And the reason is simple. For many professionals, all they can see is a fat person. More often than not, the answer to every health problem is “you should lose some weight” – irrespective of any consideration of the whole person. So […]

FNCE: Moving from Food Assistance to Food Equity

October 17, 2021 — FNCE 20201 opens today online. But pre-meeting symposia yesterday set the table for four days of rich information flowing about food and nutrition. COVID is still with us, so the meeting is virtual. Thus an outstanding session on nutrition, equity, and COVID-19 hit the mark especially well. In particular, it drew us into thinking more […]

Did Medicaid Expansion Help with Bariatric Surgery?

October 16, 2021 — A decade ago, Medicaid expansion was supposed to be a real winner for better access to care. It was a sweet deal for states adopting it. Yet our polarized politics have meant that even now, after a decade, some states are still dragging their feet. That leaves two million people from 12 states in limbo […]

Labels Change Behavior – Is That Good Enough?

October 15, 2021 — Scientia potentia est – this Latin aphorism attributed to Francis Bacon tells us that knowledge is power. This idea motivates us to seek information and turn it into wise actions. But that translation is not automatic. For instance, a new study in PLOS Medicine finds that food labels can indeed change consumer behavior to favor […]

FDA Aims to Cut Sodium in Prepared Foods by 12%

October 14, 2021 — It only took five years. But then, the U.S. government has been through a lot in those five years. Yesterday the FDA finally released voluntary guidelines aiming to cut sodium in prepared foods by 12 percent over the next two and a half years. In a joint statement, Acting Commissioner Janet Woodcock and CFSAN Director […]

COVID-19 and an Epidemic of Eating Disorders

October 13, 2021 — In so many ways, COVID-19 has turned our lives upside down, and the disruption continues. Casual – and annoying – talk about pandemic weight gain continues to swirl, thought the data on this tells a very mixed story. But something more serious is getting less attention – a sharp spike in eating disorders for young […]

Anyone Can Make Errors, Wise People Correct Them

October 12, 2021 — Progress is all around us but it’s not always obvious. Explicit weight bias is getting better, but implicit bias is as bad as ever – perhaps worse. So when people catch themselves and walk back from implicit expressions of bias, we find cause for celebration. Making errors is easy, but to correct errors – especially […]