Thoughts on the “glamourizing/normalizing” obesity vs body positivity conversations

rwecker5782 wrote: »

Although fascinated with this thread, I couldn't read all comments before I wanted to add something.
Humans are attracted to and love looking at beautiful, healthy, strong things including people. That said, there is a wide range of what people think is beautiful, healthy, and strong looking!
Unhealthy people are a cost to society in healthcare and other ways.
The food industry reminds me of TikTok and other media: They expertly and scientifically grab us and keep us coming back to them for things that increase their bottom line, not to things that benefit our health and well being! And on top of it all, we are then "blamed" for our predicaments! We are labeled "addicts" and "lazy". It is hard to eat well and live well when we are being unwittingly controlled and sabotaged by corporations that know exactly how to manipulate our brains and bodies.

These evil corporations aren't standing in front of you forcing food into your mouth. Put your big girl panties on and take responsibility for your own actions.

Well, there are a few things that should be considered. I think it a fair bet that no one enjoys being obese. It's not like they became that way on purpose. No one gets up one morning and says, " I want to be fat." There are lots of things that can cause someone to become obese. Depression can make you eat more. It can also sap your will to exercise. Sometimes an injury or permanent disability can cause someone not to be able to exercise, leading to depression, over-eating, etc... Sometimes things like thyroid issues, diabetes (insulin causes weight gain, big-time), etc..., are the cause. And sometimes it may just be a lack of self-esteem, or bad habits growing up. Whatever the cause, they are stuck with it. Until they make up their mind to do something about it if it's even possible to do so, they will be obese, with all the health issues that entail.

I'm not sure what you mean by "normalizing" or "glamorizing" obesity, I haven't seen much of either. Granted, I live on a mountain in a wilderness area, but I do go into towns occasionally. I have not noticed much of anything either way. There are fat people and there are skinny people, and there always will be. It's what inside you that counts. Anyone that is shallow enough to think otherwise is probably not worth the time or effort to converse with. At least not by me. I do not regard that as any different than being racist, or ostracizing someone for any other kind of disability. The best thing you can do for someone who is suffering from obesity is to be supportive, at least as much as you can. Whatever your beliefs, the Creator knew we would need help from time to time. That's why we were given each other...

Just my opinion, for what it is worth.

siberiantarragon wrote: »

I'm usually a "live and let live" kind of person. But what's really annoyed me this year is that obesity now negatively affects everyone, even if they are not obese. By which I mean, COVID-19 is a disease which disproportionately harms obese people. Most of the people who are hospitalized or die from it are obese, especially the non-elderly people. Countries with very low obesity rates, such as Japan and South Korea, have much lower death and hospitalization rates than other economically-similar countries, despite a high proportion of elderly people. (And this doesn't get discussed in the US -- people just say Japan and South Korea "handled the pandemic better"...as if the fact they have a 4% obesity rate and we have a 42% obesity rate plays no role.)

All year we've been in lockdowns and told that we're killing people if we go outside. Some people have lost everything to lockdowns -- their jobs, businesses, homes, mental health, physical health, education, etc. I have a health condition that is made worse by the lockdowns, and nobody cared about that. Yet I don't see many people who are obese and worried about COVID-19 doing anything to lose weight. In fact, studies indicate that most people gained weight during the lockdowns. We're all expected to blow up our lives indefinitely to reduce other peoples' risk, yet they won't even do the slightest thing to reduce their own risk. That is so selfish and unfair and yet nobody calls it out.

I think the media and government play a role in this because they haven't been really talking much about the role obesity plays in COVID-19. The UK is the only country I saw that really discussed it in any official capacity, but even then they kind of forgot about it. Meanwhile I've seen countless articles where the media talks about a "perfectly healthy young person" who died of COVID-19 and then when you see the picture, the person is 300 or 400 pounds. That just shows how sick our culture is, that being morbidly obese is now considered "perfectly healthy," because people are too afraid of offending someone to tell the truth. And that attitude is contributing to peoples' deaths, from COVID-19 and from the many other complications of obesity. Sometimes I wonder where we would be if the public health messaging this year had focused more on weight loss, instead of officials doing things like banning outdoor exercise and closing parks.

So yeah, I'm way more judgmental about "fat positivity" culture now than I used to be, because it's a big reason why we're in this mess now.

Please post stories about healthy people dying of CoVid 19 who are 400 pounds. This isn't what I see at all. Yes, taking steps to lose weight may decrease severity of disease. But BS statements like this are not helpful.

siberiantarragon wrote: »

I'm usually a "live and let live" kind of person. But what's really annoyed me this year is that obesity now negatively affects everyone, even if they are not obese. By which I mean, COVID-19 is a disease which disproportionately harms obese people. Most of the people who are hospitalized or die from it are obese, especially the non-elderly people. Countries with very low obesity rates, such as Japan and South Korea, have much lower death and hospitalization rates than other economically-similar countries, despite a high proportion of elderly people. (And this doesn't get discussed in the US -- people just say Japan and South Korea "handled the pandemic better"...as if the fact they have a 4% obesity rate and we have a 42% obesity rate plays no role.)

All year we've been in lockdowns and told that we're killing people if we go outside. Some people have lost everything to lockdowns -- their jobs, businesses, homes, mental health, physical health, education, etc. I have a health condition that is made worse by the lockdowns, and nobody cared about that. Yet I don't see many people who are obese and worried about COVID-19 doing anything to lose weight. In fact, studies indicate that most people gained weight during the lockdowns. We're all expected to blow up our lives indefinitely to reduce other peoples' risk, yet they won't even do the slightest thing to reduce their own risk. That is so selfish and unfair and yet nobody calls it out.

I think the media and government play a role in this because they haven't been really talking much about the role obesity plays in COVID-19. The UK is the only country I saw that really discussed it in any official capacity, but even then they kind of forgot about it. Meanwhile I've seen countless articles where the media talks about a "perfectly healthy young person" who died of COVID-19 and then when you see the picture, the person is 300 or 400 pounds. That just shows how sick our culture is, that being morbidly obese is now considered "perfectly healthy," because people are too afraid of offending someone to tell the truth. And that attitude is contributing to peoples' deaths, from COVID-19 and from the many other complications of obesity. Sometimes I wonder where we would be if the public health messaging this year had focused more on weight loss, instead of officials doing things like banning outdoor exercise and closing parks.

So yeah, I'm way more judgmental about "fat positivity" culture now than I used to be, because it's a big reason why we're in this mess now.

I agree. I work in the ER in Los Angeles and see Covid patients every day. We are NOT seeing young healthy in shape people die. Most of the younger people with complications are either very obese or diabetic and uncontrolled. Some people told me they have no medical problems but then their blood sugar is 500. They did not know they were diabetic apparently or someone told them they were years ago and they ignored it.

Obesity is a huge problem when it comes to Covid. We need to focus on this instead of ignoring it.

nooshi713 wrote: »

I agree. I work in the ER in Los Angeles and see Covid patients every day. We are NOT seeing young healthy in shape people die. Most of the younger people with complications are either very obese or diabetic and uncontrolled. Some people told me they have no medical problems but then their blood sugar is 500. They did not know they were diabetic apparently or someone told them they were years ago and they ignored it.

Obesity is a huge problem when it comes to Covid. We need to focus on this instead of ignoring it.

Thanks for your perspective! I've always gotten the sense that in a lot of these cases, "perfectly healthy" really meant "no diagnosed major health problems, but they also haven't been to the doctor in years" or "diagnosed with something like high blood pressure or diabetes, but in denial about it." It's good to get some confirmation that my hunch about that was correct.

What annoys me is that, since it's been nine months now, people could have lost a lot of weight and been out of the higher-risk categories (not only for COVID, but also for a bunch of other illnesses), yet they just...didn't. I think fear of offending people was a big reason why hardly anyone in public health even talked about it. But if you think about it, it makes no logical sense to avoid talking about it. Why is it offensive to ask people to lose excess weight to protect themselves and society, but not offensive to expect people to give up vitally important things such as jobs, education, non-COVID medical care, in-person socialization, etc. for the same?

Even more controversially, what if the lockdowns themselves, by worsening obesity, actually worsened the death rate from COVID-19 and other causes? But that's a discussion for another time.

AnnPT77 wrote: »

If the implication is that the Covid death rate due to obesity is penalizing the rest of us via lockdowns, I'm not sure that holds up. Countries with lower obesity rates have used lockdown strategies, IMU.

That our complication rate is high does affect others (i.e., non-obese others) via hospital ICU availability, I suppose, and possibly has to do with our obesity levels in the US. AFAIK, obese people aren't more likely to contract Covid, so probably not more likely to spread it. In fact, if they're more quickly/severely symptomatic, it seems plausible that they'd spread it less effectively than someone who's less symptomatic, keeps going out in public, but dunno.

Hereabouts, based on details of tracing for superspreader events, it's been young, active people who've been the good spreaders: They don't get very sick, behave stupidly, give it to lots of others.

Mostly, though, the effect of obesity in the time of Covid is falling on the obese, IMO. More of them get very sick, more of them die.

If there weren't so many obese and overweight people in the US and other Western countries, the death rate from COVID-19 would be lower, which means it would be a less dangerous virus and there wouldn't have to be as many restrictions for it. Also, because obese people are more likely to get severe illness, they are more likely to go to the hospital and therefore overwhelm the hospitals, and overwhelming the hospitals is the whole reason why we had lockdowns in the first place. This also means they have to be in contact with more people (healthcare workers, etc.) and risk infecting them, as opposed to someone who just stays home while sick and recovers. And, if they get more sick, they have a higher viral load, which also increases the risk and severity of infection for whoever gets it from them.

So yes, if we're operating on the principle (as we have been all year) that everyone is not only responsible for their own health, but also the health of everyone around them including complete strangers...it does negatively affect other people and increase their risk.

Countries with lower obesity rates have had fewer proportional deaths and have had less severe lockdowns. That's also why developing countries haven't had high death rates from it.

Social disapproval of obesity might help (it helped reduce smoking), but shunning is not a popular strategy these days, especially in situations where the individual's behavior is perceived to affect themselves more than it affects others.

It is worth noting that the developed countries with the lowest obesity rates (Japan and South Korea) also have a strong culture of fat shaming, although obviously I'm not saying that we should go around fat shaming people. But I've been wondering about this today...what if the messaging had been "lose weight, save lives"? Or "lose weight to prevent the healthcare system from getting overwhelmed"?

I do have to disagree with "shunning is not a popular strategy these days" though. This year has been about nothing BUT shunning.

siberiantarragon wrote: »

Thanks for your perspective! I've always gotten the sense that in a lot of these cases, "perfectly healthy" really meant "no diagnosed major health problems, but they also haven't been to the doctor in years" or "diagnosed with something like high blood pressure or diabetes, but in denial about it." It's good to get some confirmation that my hunch about that was correct.

Absolutely correct. Usually the so called healthy people haven’t been to a doctor in years and have multiple undiagnosed medical issues. Sometimes though, it is just obesity.

But I’m not surprised that people don’t want to talk about weight. Most patients don’t want you to address it and get offended when you gently mention the need to lose weight. Most diabetic people don’t take their medication and continue to eat what they want. Diabetes is the biggest health crisis in our country right now, IMO.

siberiantarragon wrote: »

@nooshi713

I was watching World News Tonight last night and they claimed that many of the deaths in Los Angeles were occurring among "younger people with no pre-existing conditions." I thought of this discussion and how the news was probably exempting obesity and undiagnosed conditions from that list.

mariamsmb1 wrote: »

Diabetes is the biggest health crisis in our country right now, IMO.

Diabetes is a big reason why I'm trying to eat healthier and exercise more. I've never been overweight, but I have PCOS which increases the risk of diabetes, and type 2 diabetes runs in my family. One of my older close relatives is pre-diabetic despite not being overweight and generally eating healthy and exercising regularly. Another close relative got it despite having a very physically demanding job for most of their life. So the people who can reverse their diabetes just by losing weight or changing their diet are lucky, in a sense.

While you're probably generally correct, I'd caution against assuming someone young and healthy must've been obese if they died. I know of many healthy weight people under 60 who have gotten a bad case of covid and required an inhaler and/or medication to bring down fever. If those folks hadn't had access to medical care or were too stubborn to go, or got sick during a spike and were turned away at first because they are younger, they mightve ended up in an ER too late to save, or died at home without being in a hospital.

I've seen tons of articles and news reports that list obesity as a risk factor for a worse case of covid. I'm sure there's a disconnect where some obese people don't acknowledge they're obese or think being "obese but otherwise healthy" means they can ignore it. But a doctor being hesitant to discuss obesity with a patient doesn't necessarily lead to doctors not reporting a patient's obesity on the record.

I would add that someone being described as heavy, or looking fat in a photo, doesn't mean they are obese. Obese is a specifically defined term, and you can't look at an undated picture of someone and determine whether they were obese. I have no doubt that the large percentage of the population that are obese leads to higher death rates, but I'd caution at making sweeping generalizations when there is still so much we are learning about how the virus works.

kimny72 wrote: »

siberiantarragon wrote: »

@nooshi713

I was watching World News Tonight last night and they claimed that many of the deaths in Los Angeles were occurring among "younger people with no pre-existing conditions." I thought of this discussion and how the news was probably exempting obesity and undiagnosed conditions from that list.

mariamsmb1 wrote: »

Diabetes is the biggest health crisis in our country right now, IMO.

Diabetes is a big reason why I'm trying to eat healthier and exercise more. I've never been overweight, but I have PCOS which increases the risk of diabetes, and type 2 diabetes runs in my family. One of my older close relatives is pre-diabetic despite not being overweight and generally eating healthy and exercising regularly. Another close relative got it despite having a very physically demanding job for most of their life. So the people who can reverse their diabetes just by losing weight or changing their diet are lucky, in a sense.

While you're probably generally correct, I'd caution against assuming someone young and healthy must've been obese if they died. I know of many healthy weight people under 60 who have gotten a bad case of covid and required an inhaler and/or medication to bring down fever. If those folks hadn't had access to medical care or were too stubborn to go, or got sick during a spike and were turned away at first because they are younger, they mightve ended up in an ER too late to save, or died at home without being in a hospital.

I've seen tons of articles and news reports that list obesity as a risk factor for a worse case of covid. I'm sure there's a disconnect where some obese people don't acknowledge they're obese or think being "obese but otherwise healthy" means they can ignore it. But a doctor being hesitant to discuss obesity with a patient doesn't necessarily lead to doctors not reporting a patient's obesity on the record.

I would add that someone being described as heavy, or looking fat in a photo, doesn't mean they are obese. Obese is a specifically defined term, and you can't look at an undated picture of someone and determine whether they were obese. I have no doubt that the large percentage of the population that are obese leads to higher death rates, but I'd caution at making sweeping generalizations when there is still so much we are learning about how the virus works.

Indeed.

The fact that Covid pretty much swept through the US women's national rowing team - the Olympic level athletes - early on, making some of them sicker than they'd ever been before in life, IMO pretty much demolishes the idea that this disease would be NBD in the US if so many of us were not obese. (It doesn't get much healthier than those rowers, and they're young.)

I shared this in another thread, but this was written by one I know, who has been listed as among the top handful of female competitive rowers in the world: https://medium.com/classroom-champions/my-covid-experience-dae2cade00c3

There's been news coverage about what appears to be permanent heart-tissue damage among high-level college football players, from Covid. Some of those guys may be over normal BMI, but in most cases, they're not obese in terms of being so fat it creates health risk. This is still a poorly-understood disease, but there are strong indications that it's deeply serious, and yes, some people die. https://www.the-scientist.com/news-opinion/college-athletes-experienced-heart-damage-after-covid-19-study-67929

Still, I'd support stronger messaging around Covid and obesity if I had the slightest inclination to believe it would move the needle on either obesity or Covid. Other messaging has not. Messaging about Covid and obesity wouldn't, either. It would be a waste of money.

The information is out there, for people whose heads are not in the sand. There have been people joining MFP saying that reducing Covid risk is among their reasons for finally deciding to lose weight. The implication is that people who are reachable with this message are getting the message. If others aren't, there's an element of willfulness, denial, or simple inattention. Spreading more information, more pointedly, is very unlikely to change that.

AnnPT77 wrote: »

kimny72 wrote: »

siberiantarragon wrote: »

@nooshi713

I was watching World News Tonight last night and they claimed that many of the deaths in Los Angeles were occurring among "younger people with no pre-existing conditions." I thought of this discussion and how the news was probably exempting obesity and undiagnosed conditions from that list.

mariamsmb1 wrote: »

Diabetes is the biggest health crisis in our country right now, IMO.

Diabetes is a big reason why I'm trying to eat healthier and exercise more. I've never been overweight, but I have PCOS which increases the risk of diabetes, and type 2 diabetes runs in my family. One of my older close relatives is pre-diabetic despite not being overweight and generally eating healthy and exercising regularly. Another close relative got it despite having a very physically demanding job for most of their life. So the people who can reverse their diabetes just by losing weight or changing their diet are lucky, in a sense.

While you're probably generally correct, I'd caution against assuming someone young and healthy must've been obese if they died. I know of many healthy weight people under 60 who have gotten a bad case of covid and required an inhaler and/or medication to bring down fever. If those folks hadn't had access to medical care or were too stubborn to go, or got sick during a spike and were turned away at first because they are younger, they mightve ended up in an ER too late to save, or died at home without being in a hospital.

I've seen tons of articles and news reports that list obesity as a risk factor for a worse case of covid. I'm sure there's a disconnect where some obese people don't acknowledge they're obese or think being "obese but otherwise healthy" means they can ignore it. But a doctor being hesitant to discuss obesity with a patient doesn't necessarily lead to doctors not reporting a patient's obesity on the record.

I would add that someone being described as heavy, or looking fat in a photo, doesn't mean they are obese. Obese is a specifically defined term, and you can't look at an undated picture of someone and determine whether they were obese. I have no doubt that the large percentage of the population that are obese leads to higher death rates, but I'd caution at making sweeping generalizations when there is still so much we are learning about how the virus works.

Indeed.

The fact that Covid pretty much swept through the US women's national rowing team - the Olympic level athletes - early on, making some of them sicker than they'd ever been before in life, IMO pretty much demolishes the idea that this disease would be NBD in the US if so many of us were not obese. (It doesn't get much healthier than those rowers, and they're young.)

I shared this in another thread, but this was written by one I know, who has been listed as among the top handful of female competitive rowers in the world: https://medium.com/classroom-champions/my-covid-experience-dae2cade00c3

There's been news coverage about what appears to be permanent heart-tissue damage among high-level college football players, from Covid. Some of those guys may be over normal BMI, but in most cases, they're not obese in terms of being so fat it creates health risk. This is still a poorly-understood disease, but there are strong indications that it's deeply serious, and yes, some people die. https://www.the-scientist.com/news-opinion/college-athletes-experienced-heart-damage-after-covid-19-study-67929

Still, I'd support stronger messaging around Covid and obesity if I had the slightest inclination to believe it would move the needle on either obesity or Covid. Other messaging has not. Messaging about Covid and obesity wouldn't, either. It would be a waste of money.

The information is out there, for people whose heads are not in the sand. There have been people joining MFP saying that reducing Covid risk is among their reasons for finally deciding to lose weight. The implication is that people who are reachable with this message are getting the message. If others aren't, there's an element of willfulness, denial, or simple inattention. Spreading more information, more pointedly, is very unlikely to change that.

The rowers had contracted the virus and were sick but per this article none luckily required hospitalization.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/24/sports/olympics/coronavirus-us-rowing-olympics.html

Probably not the case if they were all obese smokers.

AnnPT77 wrote: »

Theoldguy1 wrote: »

AnnPT77 wrote: »

kimny72 wrote: »

siberiantarragon wrote: »

@nooshi713

I was watching World News Tonight last night and they claimed that many of the deaths in Los Angeles were occurring among "younger people with no pre-existing conditions." I thought of this discussion and how the news was probably exempting obesity and undiagnosed conditions from that list.

mariamsmb1 wrote: »

Diabetes is the biggest health crisis in our country right now, IMO.

Diabetes is a big reason why I'm trying to eat healthier and exercise more. I've never been overweight, but I have PCOS which increases the risk of diabetes, and type 2 diabetes runs in my family. One of my older close relatives is pre-diabetic despite not being overweight and generally eating healthy and exercising regularly. Another close relative got it despite having a very physically demanding job for most of their life. So the people who can reverse their diabetes just by losing weight or changing their diet are lucky, in a sense.

While you're probably generally correct, I'd caution against assuming someone young and healthy must've been obese if they died. I know of many healthy weight people under 60 who have gotten a bad case of covid and required an inhaler and/or medication to bring down fever. If those folks hadn't had access to medical care or were too stubborn to go, or got sick during a spike and were turned away at first because they are younger, they mightve ended up in an ER too late to save, or died at home without being in a hospital.

I've seen tons of articles and news reports that list obesity as a risk factor for a worse case of covid. I'm sure there's a disconnect where some obese people don't acknowledge they're obese or think being "obese but otherwise healthy" means they can ignore it. But a doctor being hesitant to discuss obesity with a patient doesn't necessarily lead to doctors not reporting a patient's obesity on the record.

I would add that someone being described as heavy, or looking fat in a photo, doesn't mean they are obese. Obese is a specifically defined term, and you can't look at an undated picture of someone and determine whether they were obese. I have no doubt that the large percentage of the population that are obese leads to higher death rates, but I'd caution at making sweeping generalizations when there is still so much we are learning about how the virus works.

Indeed.

The fact that Covid pretty much swept through the US women's national rowing team - the Olympic level athletes - early on, making some of them sicker than they'd ever been before in life, IMO pretty much demolishes the idea that this disease would be NBD in the US if so many of us were not obese. (It doesn't get much healthier than those rowers, and they're young.)

I shared this in another thread, but this was written by one I know, who has been listed as among the top handful of female competitive rowers in the world: https://medium.com/classroom-champions/my-covid-experience-dae2cade00c3

There's been news coverage about what appears to be permanent heart-tissue damage among high-level college football players, from Covid. Some of those guys may be over normal BMI, but in most cases, they're not obese in terms of being so fat it creates health risk. This is still a poorly-understood disease, but there are strong indications that it's deeply serious, and yes, some people die. https://www.the-scientist.com/news-opinion/college-athletes-experienced-heart-damage-after-covid-19-study-67929

Still, I'd support stronger messaging around Covid and obesity if I had the slightest inclination to believe it would move the needle on either obesity or Covid. Other messaging has not. Messaging about Covid and obesity wouldn't, either. It would be a waste of money.

The information is out there, for people whose heads are not in the sand. There have been people joining MFP saying that reducing Covid risk is among their reasons for finally deciding to lose weight. The implication is that people who are reachable with this message are getting the message. If others aren't, there's an element of willfulness, denial, or simple inattention. Spreading more information, more pointedly, is very unlikely to change that.

The rowers had contracted the virus and were sick but per this article none luckily required hospitalization.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/24/sports/olympics/coronavirus-us-rowing-olympics.html

Probably not the case if they were all obese smokers.

Sure. The point is, even young, healthy people get very sick. The starting proposition here seemed to be that if the US didn't have so many obese people, there wouldn't be so many deaths, and if there weren't so many deaths, the country wouldn't have had activity restrictions/shutdowns.

My point was that this is a very serious disease, with pretty awful experiences and consequences even among the young and very healthy. I believe we would have (need) activity restrictions/shutdowns even if we had fewer obese people, and a lower death rate. Our infection rate is absurd, for a developed country. That's not because of the number of obese people. It has more to do with bad governmental responses, and careless or science-denying people in the public who spread the disease unnecessarily. (Messaging aimed at the latter isn't very likely to be effective either, or I'd support more of that.)

We had people in the US having "Covid parties" supposedly to get it over with or create herd immunity (I guess), and some of those people (and others they had contact with) died. Personally, I feel more anger toward people like that (or the kids here in Michigan in the local superspreader event, like the the one who hosted a bonfire party for all his friends while symptomatic), than toward people who're obese, have gotten Covid, and died.

I'd have no problem with the hosts of "Covid Parties" being sentenced with community service work moving bodies of Covid victims around in a morgue, some of lowest of the low in society IMO.

However IMO that doesn't preclude the need for messaging to improve general health (just like the need for masks, social distancing and hand washing) which would include improved diet, better sleep, quitting smoking, and reducing obesity as a way to help minimize the impact if one gets Covid.

Another "normalizing obesity" COVID example: "She’s young, has no serious health conditions — and hasn’t left isolation since March" (woman in the photo is obese). It's also a testament to the normalization of obesity that this woman is so concerned about her health that she hasn't gone outside in 265 days for fear of catching COVID, yet doesn't mention anything about losing weight to reduce her risk of dying (from COVID and other causes).

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/the_americas/brazil-coronavirus-quarantine-lockdown-isolation/2020/12/30/3997dc10-3971-11eb-bc68-96af0daae728_story.html

kimny72 wrote: »

You cannot tell from that picture that she is obese.

Really? Like...really?

You are far more sure of the risk factors and their roles than researchers actually working on Covid are. Covid 19 is a novel virus. It will take years for experts to provide the kind of detailed data you are asking for in your posts.

I already posted an article where researchers stated obesity is the biggest risk factor for hospitalizations/deaths after age, and there's plenty of similar articles out there. So clearly a lot of people are studying this and must have studied population samples by age and so on. The problem is most of the original texts of these scientific articles with the data are behind paywalls, so we have to rely on mass media to report it, and they only give an overview if they report on it at all.

I have no doubt being obese makes it harder for your body to survive the virus, but you are talking about this stuff like everyone knows how this works and that we all know all we need to do is convince anyone who looks overweight to lose weight and crisis averted. I just don't see any evidence it's that cut and dried.

I never said that. You're putting words in my mouth. All I said is that I think it's unfair that some people are expected to sacrifice indefinitely (and in some cases die, become homeless, etc.) because of lockdowns to protect total strangers from COVID, and yet most people who have preventable risk factors for COVID aren't doing anything to mitigate their own risk, thereby making the problem of COVID and lockdowns worse than it otherwise would be. If it's now my responsibility to sacrifice my own health to protect everyone else's health, then I think the least they can do is minimize their burden on the healthcare system by taking care of themselves. And I now judge the normalization of obesity a lot more than I used to, because it's contributing to the COVID problem and yet hardly anyone is acknowledging it because it's "politically incorrect" (and probably also because it would cut into food industry profits).

Masks don't eliminate the risk of dying from COVID, but they reduce it. Avoiding social interaction doesn't eliminate the risk of dying from COVID, but it reduces it. Similarly, getting to a healthy weight doesn't eliminate the risk of dying, but it reduces it. It's been considered acceptable all year to judge and shame others for socializing, which is vital for human survival.

We have an obesity problem in Australia too but the corona virus is no where near as out of control as it is in the US I think mainly because of the way our government handled it