May 6, 2024 — Sometime in the 1960s, economist Ronald Coase, a Nobel laureate, advised colleagues that torturing a set of data can always yield a confession to serve the purpose at hand. As if to prove this adage, a new publication in the Journal of Clinical Epidemiology shows us 1,208 ways to analyze NHANES data on all-cause mortality […]
May 2, 2024 — On the subject of nutrition and health, we commonly encounter strong statements presented as scientific truths that must be honored. Headlines scream that “ultra-processed food is killing us,” using studies of correlation to justify sounding an alarm. “Cows are just an environmental disaster,” says Hannah Ritchie in the New York Times. But with equally great […]
April 21, 2024 — Healthy eating and active living. For decades now, programs to prevent obesity have followed the conventional wisdom that pursuing these two ideals will solve the problem. The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation pledged a billion dollars to prevent childhood obesity by following this template: “By 2025, we want to ensure that children in America grow up […]
April 13, 2024 — In The Conversation this week, Emma Beckett tells us that drugs for treating obesity won’t cure it, “but they might make us more fat-phobic.” Her rationale is simple enough. All the buzz “plays into ideas of fat stigma and fat phobia.” No matter that doctors, scientists, and the FDA all say otherwise, she says these […]
April 5, 2024 — If we didn’t know better, we might think Anahad O’Connor and the Washington Post are deliciously clever satirists. They have a new contribution to the catalog of conspiracy theories. In short, O’Connor explains that the reach of HAES (Health at Every Size) messaging comes from a Big Food conspiracy. This plot involves registered dietitians aiding […]
February 16, 2024 — Influencers are not doctors. They can’t understand the science issues with obesity drugs. That’s not what they do. With expressive skill, a leading influencer in the fat acceptance movement put her finger on an important issue in the Washington Post this week. On this, we totally agree. If we listen to many social media influencers, […]
December 4, 2023 — By the end of this month, we will be seeing lists of what’s in and what’s out for the coming year. For people whose minds drift toward liver disease, we have an entry. Fatty liver is out and steatotic liver is in. NAFLD goes to the dustbin, replaced by MASLD, while MASH takes over from […]
October 7, 2023 — We have mixed feelings about a new report in JAMA this week about GLP-1 agonists and the associated risk of gastrointestinal adverse events. On one hand, this is helpful data. It is a reminder that despite all of the sensational reporting about “weight loss miracles,” these drugs are serious medicines that require careful prescribing and […]
October 2, 2023 — To be sure, we are making progress. Nonetheless, it’s reasonable to ask if we are yet taking the chronic disease of obesity seriously. Or are we just playing at it? Writing in The Lancet, Priya Sumithran, Francis Finucane, and Ricardo Cohen suggest we may still be doing more of the latter: “How we handle obesity […]
August 8, 2023 — Folks who have not detected a shift in public discourse about obesity are simply not listening. In that shift, we detect some easing in longstanding bias about this disease. But perspective is difficult. Is the proverbial glass half full with progress to celebrate? Or is the remaining void a reminder that overcoming weight bias and […]
