Posts Tagged ‘innovation’

Michelle Obama Starts a Healthy Food Company

May 6, 2023 — Nope. We are not done with fighting obesity by selling water, fruits, and veggies. Former First Lady Michelle Obama is starting a healthy food and beverage company with the help of private equity. Ordinarily, we’re supposed to think of private equity as the bad guys – helping the rich get richer and driving wider disparities. […]

Ways of Paying for Innovation in Obesity Care

May 4, 2023 — How can we possibly afford paying for all of the innovation that’s coming in obesity care? This is hardly an academic question. It’s a practical one that flickers in the minds of policymakers who balk at finding ways to make effective treatment for obesity more accessible to the people with great medical needs for it. […]

YWM Virtual: Translating Advances in Obesity

May 1, 2023 — Translating the stunning advances we’re presently seeing in obesity into something that both patients and professionals can appreciate is no small feat. But this is what just happened over the weekend at the Obesity Action Coalition YWM Virtual conference. A planning team led by Bob Kushner and Scott Kahan assembled a small faculty of some […]

Is Mounjaro Gliding Toward an Obesity Approval?

April 28, 2023 — Tirzepatide, marketed by Lilly under the  Mounjaro brand, may be gliding toward an FDA approval for obesity later this year. A year ago, the first phase 3 study results for tirzepatide in obesity wowed us. Yesterday, Lilly revealed yet another impressive piece of the puzzle – impressive weight reduction in persons who have both obesity […]

Tab or Jab? Oral Semaglutide for Obesity

March 27, 2023 — While Ozempic and Wegovy – two injectable forms of semaglutide – have been grabbing headlines, an oral tablet form – Rybelsus – has been quietly building momentum. Right now, it’s only approved for use in type 2 diabetes. But on Friday, Novo Nordisk announced results from the first phase 3 study of oral semaglutide for […]

Preventing Obesity at the Entrance to Causal Pathways

March 23, 2023 — We face a pivot point for public health strategies to prevent obesity. The advent of advanced medicines for obesity treatment brings critical questions. Can we find better strategies for preventing obesity at the entrance to causal pathways for it? Or will we instead depend solely on medical interventions to reduce the harm it causes? These […]

Obesity Care Week 2023: Looking Forward and Back

February 27, 2023 — More than a decade of life as a champion for obesity care has been an enlightening road to travel. Obesity Care Week 2023 is a great occasion for looking forward because there can be no doubt. As Axios recently explained, the healthcare system is in the midst of a great re-think of obesity: “Doctors and […]

Real Conversations About Obesity Med Costs?

February 20, 2023 — Public discourse about new medicines for treating obesity is easy to find right now – and a lot of it seems unreal from our vantage point. Headlines about people “terrified” by the prospect of effective options for kids with severe obesity or debating which Hollywood stars might be taking one of these drugs are weirdly off-topic. […]

Comfortable Opinions, Uncomfortable Thinking

February 19, 2023 — Sixty years ago, President John F. Kennedy warned the graduating class at Yale that too often “We enjoy the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought.” Public discourse on the subject of obesity right now is certainly bringing that thought into vivid view. Over and over again, we hear supposed experts expressing their comfortable […]

Is Medical Care Becoming a Luxury?

February 8, 2023 — “I can’t afford to spend any more time here [in the hospital]. I don’t have the money.” These are the words of a victim in the mass shooting at Half Moon Bay, California, last month. It points to an uncomfortable truth. Increasingly, medical care is becoming a luxury. Helaine Olen describes it for the Washington […]