May 31, 2023 — Plenty of people have strong feelings about metabolic and bariatric surgery (MBS) for young persons. The idea that it might even be an option for youth can inflame the passions of people who are happy to dictate what medical care should and should not be available to other people. This response drew a lot of […]
May 18, 2023 — It is impossible to miss. At ECO2023, we are seeing tremendous excitement about advances in obesity care – mixed with concern about what happens when those advances meet with reality. As ECO2023 unfolds, we’re hearing more about the advances that new obesity medicines are offering, but we’re also hearing reminders about the gap between the […]
May 2, 2023 — “Especially for children, diet and lifestyle must remain at the forefront of obesity prevention and treatment.” This conviction, summing up a new editorial in JAMA, beautifully captures the discomfort that the availability of more effective treatments for obesity causes. The belief persists that diets and exercise are the right way to reverse obesity. So the […]
April 20, 2023 — Like never before, we are in the midst of intensive public discourse about obesity, obesity care, and weight loss. Some of it is frivolous and some of it is frankly misleading. But what is really good in the middle of all this is that more people than ever before have options for dealing with obesity […]
March 28, 2023 — A close look at how health insurance denies access to care for children and youth with severe obesity reveals one thing. The system is really set up as insurance for profits – not for health. The story of Debra and Dan Tyler seeking care for one of their daughters, as reported by Ariana Eunjung Cha […]
March 15, 2023 — One of the most disappointing responses to the new guideline for obesity care in children and adolescents came from the Academy of Eating Disorders. Shortly after AAP published its evidence-based guideline for obesity care, the Academy for Eating Disorders issued a press release to criticize it. But their criticism used speculation rather than data to […]
March 4, 2023 — Today – World Obesity Day – is all about changing perspectives. The World Obesity Federation deserves credit for a well-chosen theme, because in the face of much new evidence about obesity, old perspectives are crashing into newer ones driven by evidence and science. Research has brought us new options for treating obesity more safely and […]
February 1, 2023 — “I would tell them to look beyond the weight and accept me.” These words of a 17-year-boy point to twisted ideas about body weight that surface in the relationships among parents and teens. The words come from a mixed-methods study just published in Body Image by Samantha Lawrence and colleagues. Why is this such an […]
January 29, 2023 — Reading about the heated and not terribly well-reasoned arguments people are having about obesity prompts a sad conclusion. A history of ineffective and, at times, harmful anti-obesity campaigns may have poisoned the well of public sentiment about obesity. People have such strong feelings that facts and reason become irrelevant. Aggrieved Advocates for People with Eating […]
January 27, 2023 — We count on newspapers for coming up with sensational headlines to inflame passions. Opinion pages seldom disappoint. But those flames of passion very often bring more heat than light. Such was the case yesterday when the New York Times published a sensational headline for an opinion article by a HAES activist, Virginia Sole-Smith. She wants […]
