October 1, 2023 — Words matter. They convey both facts and feelings and the wrong words create misunderstandings that are sometimes irreparable. Because of this, we notice the imbalance in public discourse about new medicines for obesity that more often casts them as weight loss drugs than as medicines for the care and treatment of obesity. Fortunately, others are […]
September 10, 2023 — The impulse to do it yourself is strong – even in healthcare. Self-care can be essential for good health, but because it has its limits, it can easily feed into self-shame. In an essay for the New York Times, pediatrician Aaron Carroll shares his own experience with this: “Despite all the advances in science, we […]
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 […]
June 11, 2023 — Health stigma presents a difficult problem because it prompts competing human impulses of cruelty and denial. Together, these impulses get in the way of better health. Attach stigma to a disease or a health condition and the people who have it begin to feel socially undesirable and isolated. So understandably, they may hide the condition, […]
June 5, 2023 — One of the neat tricks of semaglutide and tirzepatide is their unexpected ability to shift the frames of bias through which we look at obesity and human behavior. Neuroscience and behavioral psychology have long told us the human desire for food is not purely a matter of choice. Yet in addressing obesity, weight bias and […]
May 29, 2022 — Public health should stop talking about obesity, says a policy brief from University of Illinois Chicago School of Public Health. “Replace assignments connecting ‘obesity’ and health,” suggests the brief. Cancel the word obesity and weight stigma will fade. That seems to be the thinking there. At the other extreme, we have folks who love to […]
May 10, 2022 — Cancer is not just exuberant cell growth. Nor is depression simply a matter of feeling sad. Likewise obesity is not a simple matter of living in a larger body. But cancer, depression, and obesity are medical words that can be daunting and also misused. And each of them can bring stigma to complicate any efforts […]
May 7, 2022 — The sheer volume of information that emerges from an international conference like ECO2022 is overwhelming. We will be digesting new insights for months after the conference concludes today. One source of insights comes from a massive global survey of teen obesity presented Thursday – ACTION Teens. Perhaps it should not be a surprise. But this […]
March 27, 2022 — Weight bias is a moving target. It is moving from a shout to a quiet murmur, from explicit shaming to implicit insults. In 2015, a peer-reviewed medical journal would publish advice to tell patients bluntly that obesity is their fault. With an AJM editorial then, Robert Doroghazi wrote that he thought it best to confront […]
March 24, 2022 — The economy of shame and pride is at work in human cultures everywhere. Public shaming can take aim at whole countries and companies or at random individuals. In The Shame Machine, Cathy O’Neil describes shame as the foundation for an industry that can destroy people: “Humiliation lingers in the mind, the heart, the veins, the […]
