In The News...

AMA Votes to Classify Obesity as a Disease 
     On June 18, 2013 the American Medical Association (AMA) formally classified obesity as a disease.  And that means obesity, like cancer or heart disease, requires medical treatment.  According to the New York Times (6/18/2013) delegates at the AMA's annual meeting in Chicago refused to accept a recommendation by a committee not to designate obesity as a disease.  The newspaper also cited AMA board member, Dr. Patrice Harris as saying that the new classification would "help change the way the medical community tackles this complex issue."  But how? The medical community has not had great success in stemming the rise of Type 2 diabetes and physicians traditionally receive only a minimum of training in nutrition.  Here we go again!!!  Acting as if a medical model for what may well be a political, economic, and social disease problem can solve fatness on a global level.  How arrogant!  How desperate!
      While the classification of obesity as a disease might justify reimbursement for drugs, counseling, and surgery, it certainly conflicts with today's practices.  Medicare declared in 2004 that obesity is not a disease and specifically stipulates that Medicare Part D which covers prescription drugs can not be used for weight loss drugs; one also can't get drug coverage for hair growth or erectile dysfunction.
       In a sense, the AMA decision is noteworthy because members in the House of Delegates decided not to let a few facts get in the way.  They specifically ignored the findings of AMA's Council on Science and Public Health which studied the obesity issue for a year.  Those findings concluded that obesity could not be treated as a disease since the BMI (Body Measurement Index), the very measure used to define obesity, is iteself  "simplistic and flawed."
       Even so, as the New York Times reports, the delegates had good reasons and their resolution said: "The suggestion that obesity is not a disease but rather a consequence of a chosen lifestyle exemplified by overeating and/or inactivity is equivalent to suggesting that lung cancer is not a disease because it was brought about by individual choice to smoke cigarettes.” 
      The end result is that now a physician can say that an obese person is not fat, but sick!  But a very real question is how can doctors treat such sickness when they can't even agree upon what is the best diet or way to achieve weight loss.
      What do you think?  Is obesity a disease?
     


1 comment:

  1. The medical treatments currently available for obesity are rather drastic. Are we going to have more gastric bypass surgeries? Will the reclassification of obesity remove stigmas about fat or obese people?

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