Follow the accumulating evidence and observations that shape our view of health policy and obesity
June 6, 2020 — Age, by far, is the most important risk factor for bad outcomes with COVID-19. But after that, it’s become clear that obesity is an important risk for bad outcomes. In children, of course, serious cases are relatively rare. But lately they have been cropping up more frequently in the U.S. Now, a new report in […]
June 5, 2020 — These are times that present us with extreme but false choices. Lives versus livelihoods. Chaos versus oppression. Add to that list an extreme, false dichotomy on obesity. At one extreme, we have two fat acceptance advocates advocates arguing that concern about obesity is nothing more than an expression of racism. At the other, a conservative […]
June 4, 2020 — Should dietary guidelines tell the public to eat as little saturated fat as possible? This is definitely a hot debate. But we’re not so sure it’s a great one. Perhaps it’s just becoming tiresome. Regardless, what’s clear is that when top experts presented this debate at Nutrition Live Online, it was a great event. In […]
June 3, 2020 — Most people think of obesity as an issue of body weight. But in fact, weight is merely an artifact. It’s a side effect of what’s really going on in the physiology of obesity. In fact, an excess of adipose tissue that harms health is what defines obesity. In turn, one of the key pathways for […]
June 2, 2020 — Nutrition Live Online 2020 opened with NIH Director Francis Collins and the Presidential Symposium on the ethics of eating. We had expected to be wowed by Director Collins. And of course, he is impressive. However, Harvard’s Anna Grummond impressed us even more. She explained that it’s ethically OK to put warnings on food that might […]
June 1, 2020 — Complexity makes the brain hurt. Both nutrition and obesity present challenges that resist simple answers. There is no one healthful way to eat, though many false prophets of nutrition will preach that they have the one true way. Quick fixes for obesity are rare, though many people are eager to tell us that they know […]
May 31, 2020 — We’ve mentioned it before. During the lockdown, our instinct has been to get out and walk. We see lots of people out running. We have seen families walking together that we’ve never seen before. And a new working paper (i.e., not yet peer reviewed) offers evidence to suggest physical activity during the lockdown might be […]
May 30, 2020 — Like a dog with a bone, Nina Teicholz is not ready to let it go. She has a point to make and a book to sell. It’s all about pushing everyone to eat a low-carb diet. No matter what the problem, we find her telling us that low-carb diets, with plenty of saturated fats, are […]
May 29, 2020 — Hope and fear. These are powerful, related motivators readily available during the coronavirus pandemic. The motivations are not always clear, but many people are shoveling out claims about “game changers” for dealing with the virus that haunts us. Some of these supposed game changers turn out to be disastrous duds. So caution about coronahype is […]
May 28, 2020 — It’s an odd irony. New data, released yesterday from the Kaiser Family Foundation, tells us that people are skipping healthcare because of the COVID-19 health crisis. In fact, roughly half (48 percent) of Americans say they or someone in their household have postponed healthcare due to the pandemic. One in five (23 percent) of those […]
