November 24, 2022 — Much research goes into understanding how our environment prompts relentlessly rising problems with obesity – with good reason. Much of that research focuses on the substance of the food itself. The characteristics of ultra-processed food is a favorite topic right now. So we find delight in recent research that focuses instead on the broader context […]
November 20, 2022 — Fed up. That’s where we are with stories about how people taking semaglutide for obesity are keeping people with diabetes from getting an adequate supply of the drug they need. Fed up, because it’s a stealthy way of expressing implicit bias against people living with obesity. The subtext is that those people don’t really need […]
November 16, 2022 — It’s a fact. Media needs your attention. Thus, journalistic standards live in in tension with the temptation for sensational headlines that trivialize a subject like obesity. We’ve seen it before. Yet the current crop of sensational headlines offering a twisted understanding of serious new obesity treatments is especially disappointing. Here’s an example from the supposedly […]
November 8, 2022 — It was lovely speculation while it lasted. Ultra-processed fake meat was going to save the planet and our health. Pat Brown, the founder and former CEO of Impossible Foods, claimed he could conjure up plant-based meat that’s “vastly better” than real meat. Even McDonald’s took the bait and began testing the McPlant™ burger. But unsurprisingly […]
November 7, 2022 — There’s a clue in the strained supply of new obesity and diabetes meds that most everyone is missing. For more than a year now, Novo Nordisk has been unable to produce and distribute an adequate supply of semaglutide in the form of Wegovy for the treatment of obesity. This has knock-on effects. So supply of […]
October 31, 2022 — One of the themes you will hear when ObesityWeek gets underway tomorrow in San Diego is the dramatic progress that’s coming into view with new obesity drugs. But the picture quickly becomes murky in the real world because of issues with supply and access to these new and improved obesity meds. The access to care […]
October 15, 2022 — In GQ recently, Will Peischel asked if the world is ready for extremely effective weight-loss drugs. Of course, the simple answer is yes and no. First of all, it’s clear enough that most people don’t really understand these drugs or the condition they treat. Peischel makes that clear right up front when he calls them […]
October 9, 2022 — This afternoon at FNCE, Hope Warshaw will be moderating a wide-ranging conversation with David Kessler. He is the FDA commissioner who oversaw the requirement to put Nutrition Facts labels on food back in 1994. That’s when many ideas took shape in the popular imagination about what a healthy food is. Now is a good time […]
October 8, 2022 — Weight loss is a complicated subject these days. For good reasons, many people hesitate to dwell on it. Moral panic about fatness, weight bias and stigma, and concerns about eating disorders have made this subject controversial at times. So as we look at the meeting at the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics that starts today […]
October 5, 2022 — Toxic beauty standards are costly – both in terms of health and wealth. This message resonates from a new report funded by the Dove Beauty Bar brand and published jointly with the STRIPED project at the Harvard School of Public Health. This report details the cost of unrealistic beauty standards exploited by a beauty industry […]
