February 10, 2023 — We are in the midst of a fundamental change in the understanding of obesity. Years of hand-wringing – with urgent calls to eat less and move more – promoted weight stigma more than it reduced obesity prevalence. To counter this, the trademarked Health at Every Size (HAES) movement rose up to call out the mistake […]
January 24, 2023 — These are three problems that often travel together. But each one by itself is a problem – stigma, obesity, and heart disease. Now, a new study from the University of Connecticut gives us some of the best empiric evidence yet for the distinct harm that weight stigma adds to obesity and heart disease. Randomized and […]
June 26, 2022 — Health at Every Size® is both an idea and a trademark. The trademark is owned by the Association for Size Diversity and Health. The idea is all about a view of health independent of a person’s weight. So folks who travel in the HAES® orbit take a dim view of the word obesity – even […]
February 23, 2022 — Are we listening to each other? Not too much, it seems. It’s not even clear that we’re listening to ourselves. Often, we’re too busy making a point. Right now, we’re hearing a lot of people making points about weight neutral healthcare. Dani Donovan, a 30-year-old patient advocate with binge eating disorder recently found a medical […]
March 10, 2021 — The scramble for COVID-19 vaccination is clearly messy. For one thing, people who need it most have found it hard to get. And then we have others, with sharp elbows and privilege, who want to be at the front of the line. To claim priority that public health guidelines don’t grant them. So when you […]
October 20, 2020 — Do dietitians who align themselves with Health at Every Size (HAES, a registered trademark) have less weight bias? Does weight bias training help? New research presented at FNCE aimed to find out. The answers were a bit mixed, though. It all depends upon whether you look at explicit or implicit bias. If a dietitian was […]
October 18, 2020 — At FNCE yesterday, weight bias was very much on the minds of 1,401 participants. That’s how many nutrition professionals tuned into the hour-long session we moderated. Colleen Tewksbury, Kellene Isom, and Rebecca Pearl offered impressive insights on challenging weight bias. Clearly, weight bias is all around us. In fact, a new study finds that 57 […]
June 27, 2020 — Early in the pandemic, CDC identified a higher risk for severe symptoms with COVID-19 in people with severe obesity. This week, the agency broadened its guidance to include all individuals with a BMI of 30 or greater. This is the epidemiologic benchmark for obesity – severe or not. What’s more, it’s a benchmark that describes […]
May 23, 2020 — On Friday, the BMJ released the largest peer-reviewed prospective study of risk factors for severe symptoms or death with COVID-19 to date. Age over 50, being male, obesity, and other chronic diseases stand out as important risk factors. By now, this is a pattern that is quite familiar. But it does more than just make […]
