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Obesity. Covid literally attacks obese people. And obese people also are at huge risk. I'm overweight and I was literally frightened during covid. Now I lift

Obesity. Covid literally attacks obese people. And obese people also are at huge risk. I'm overweight and I was literally frightened during covid. Now I lift weights every day and work on my diet very hard. But we are literally ignoring the elephant (literally) in the room.

NovaVeles 4y ago
The big wake up call for me was a few years earlier. I had just hit 130Kg (285+ pounds) and I had just had enough of it all! By the time I had COVID earlier this year I was down to around 90Kg (198 pounds) - I get the feeling that helped out immensely compared with how I used to be. Vaccines also did their part combined with the lessening impacts of the various variants. The other thing that got brought to my attention was an off handed comment about various health issues that are impacting populations. Things like declining fertility and increasing health issues almost always correlate more with obesity rather than the environmental factors. Yes, correlation is not causation but it does seem at fairly plausible. For example could things like micro plastics be doing these things? Yes. But one would expect these to be near global - yet the impacts are felt mostly in obese nations. It could potentially be a threat multiplier however.
- strken 4y ago
  The rise in obesity is likely environmental. It's entirely possible that microplastics or PFAS (or whatever contaminant you want to point the finger at) causes obesity, which then causes health issues.
  - Bakary 4y ago
    It's fairly obvious when you travel to places with high obesity that the problem is environmental, but microplastics aren't even going to be in the top 20 reasons for that. The food culture in those places is just completely busted. You can sense it even in layovers at US airports.
  - acdha 4y ago
    It’s lifestyle: Americans lead the world in both obesity and car centric lifestyles, and we have a ton of reinforcing factors – suburbs designed around cars are unpleasant/unsafe to be active in, people eat unhealthy food because it’s cheap (cars and suburbs are both more expensive) and something they can eat in the car or pickup on the way home, kids are prevented from exercising because there are few safe places in their neighborhoods, etc. Americans who live in walkable settings are healthier on average but it’s not like they aren’t exposed to the same chemicals as their suburban counterparts.
    - nightski 4y ago
      Suburbs are very walkable. You don't always have to have a destination to walk to. My wife & I walk every night for an hour and enjoy observing our neighborhood.
      - tdeck 4y ago
        It's nice that the suburb you lived in is enjoyable to walk in, but that's not what the word "walkable" means in the context of a neighborhood. Walkable means you can accomplish daily tasks by using walking as a mode of transportation, not just a form of leisure. To address your main point, many US suburbs are not safe to walk in. Many suburbs lack things like sidewalks, crosswalks, and traffic signals for pedestrians because pedestrians are a complete afterthought. Other places have a sidewalk but no shade, or are by roads with loud high-speed traffic so they're not pleasant to walk in. I've lived in all of these kinds of places and it really affects your willingness to walk anywhere.
        nightski 4y ago
        That's too bad. In the area around where I live I have yet to encounter a suburb that doesn't have sidewalks! I understand what you meant by "walkability". I also don't think it's fun or practical. I tend to visit a lot of different stores, not just one or two. But I only go out shopping once a week or two, not daily. That sounds exhausting. I also hate super dense living being packed in like sardines with everyone else. It's nice having a house with a decent sized yard and 10+ trees. Plenty of space and isolation, but at the same time close enough to friendly neighbors to socialize with. More Americans should give small to mid size cities a chance. They have a lot to offer. Far cheaper too, our neighborhood definitely isn't wealthy.
Waterluvian 4y ago
Doesn’t obesity put one at greater risk for basically everything? Or is Covid exceptionally harmful to the obese for some reason?
- marcosdumay 4y ago
  Covid is exceptionally harmful to the obese for some reason. That's well known since 2020, but I don't thinkg anybody knows the reason.
butwhywhyoh 4y ago
You used the word literally four times in your post, and even twice in one sentence. What's the fascination with this word? It seems to be used to add completely unneeded emphasis, rather than anything resembling its original definition.
- serf 4y ago
  it's a regionally-biased twitch filler word, like like, that happens to have a functional value of adding emphasis. just filter it out. we all have certain ways that we bias our communications. I certainly do.
- quickthrower2 4y ago
  Probably trying to convey emotion/emphasis through plain text.
jldugger 4y ago
The good news is that maybe we got it backwards, in at least some of the cases[1]: > Higher fasting insulin and higher c-reactive protein confound the association between BMI and the risk of all-cause mortality. The increase in mortality that has been attributed to higher BMI is more likely due to hyperinsulinemia and inflammation rather than obesity. [1]: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41366-022-01211-2 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41366-022-01211-2
- losteric 4y ago
  > The increase in mortality that has been attributed to higher BMI is more likely due to hyperinsulinemia and inflammation rather than obesity Not sure I understand this sentencen. Are they saying hyperinsulinemia and inflammation are independent of obesity? Both symptoms of <X>?
  - orwin 4y ago
    What i understood (this is quite new and i haven't had time to research this): Some nutritionists and medical practitioner think that most obesity (the >35BMI kind) are caused by hormones (some gland inflammation, like i said i didn't researched this) or prediabetes. Hence why European immigrants are not hit the same as natives in the US, as phylogenetic have quite an impact on hormones production. This was an old theory and some recent research proved that at least it needs to be investigated more seriously. In general hormones effect on human development, while being quite an active field, seems to be still underfunded or at least more ignored than it should be.
quickthrower2 4y ago
Low carb diet helped me with this. Calories in calories out, but if you have a lot of carbs you are going to get hungry when restricting the calories, whereas on a low carb diet I sometimes have to think hard as to whether I have had breakfast or not by 10am. Having woke up at 7am. "Oh I should probably eat something..." I think I have less than 50g of carbs a day, and probably 1500 calories but I don't track it too closely. I also do strength, but a little each day and make it incidental. I might play with the TRX or do a few pull up or dips at the park while the dogs are off leash. Something that makes it easier is there are low carb treats and drinks. It does mean taking in more alcohol (as in chemically an alcohol, not ethanol) based sweeteners, so I worry about that a little. For someone who doesn't go out much this is easy, but in your younger years with social pressure it might take a lot of will power, and even changing your friends and breaking up with partners and so forth to support this kind of habit, since it goes counter to the average person's culture in the west. Especially quitting alcohol too.
- strken 4y ago
  A lot of success in fixing your diet comes from experimenting and seeing what works for you. Low carb can help some people, while particular carb-heavy but satiating foods like oats or potatoes can help others. I don't think it's always clear-cut.
  - quickthrower2 4y ago
    I agree. Everyone needs to be their own doctor, because they have an intuition for their own body. (Dieting is being your own doctor by the way!)
  - prmoustache 4y ago
    Additionnally, regardless of the diet a key is to relearn to eat slowly. By eating too fast we tend to feel satiated too late.
- SOLAR_FIELDS 4y ago
  Quitting alcohol and going to OMAD (one meal a day) helped me lose 20 kilos in < 2 months. And I wasn’t even obese, that was straight from overweight to goal weight. Alcohol is an enormous contributor to weight for several different reasons. Plus, the weight you get as a drinker (the “hard” fat) is the worst kind of fat your body can have.
remarkEon 4y ago
Hear, hear. One of the greatest failings of our "modern" healthcare system is that there's no plan to address this crisis. Obesity is the gateway to what seems like an infinite amount of health complications - not to mention the additional burden on the health care system itself when they get sick. I fully acknowledge that it's a difficult subject, it upsets people, and it's uncomfortable. The greatest healthcare advice our leaders can give us right now is for everyone to exercise a little more and lost a little weight. Isn't this the perfect time for that? We're coming out of a pandemic and we have the actual data that showed that obese people were uniquely susceptible to bad outcomes from this disease.
- midoridensha 4y ago
  >One of the greatest failings of our "modern" healthcare system is that there's no plan to address this crisis. Obesity is the gateway to what seems like an infinite amount of health complications What are they supposed to do? Obesity is caused by American's terrible lifestyle. Healthcare systems can only do so much to compensate for a bad lifestyle. Stop drinking alcohol, and start walking everywhere instead of driving.
  - remarkEon 4y ago
    >Healthcare systems can only do so much to compensate for a bad lifestyle. And this right here is my problem. Healthcare doesn't only begin when you get to the doctor or the hospital. There's no reason that healthcare officials/leaders/experts/whatever can't recommend baseline levels of fitness for Americans, and provide help for getting to that standard. I don't know, maybe Healthcare plans should include subsidies for gym memberships by law.
    - j-bos 4y ago
      This would be a beautiful dream
    - barbazoo 4y ago
      Imagine what half the population would say if an expert or an authority started telling people to walk more, eat less and eat better.
fortran77 4y ago
I'm always amazed that few people want to talk about this. Early on in the pandemic, the NY Times acted shocked, shocked that 7 members of this family all died from COVID https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/18/nyregion/new-jersey-family-coronavirus.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/18/nyregion/new-jersey-famil... As you said, nobody dared mention the 7 elephants in the room. In fact, the Times said: > "But the virus’s devastating toll on a single family is considered as rare as it is perplexing."
- morsch 4y ago
  Seven people were infected, four died.
- TechBro8615 4y ago
  NYT editors knew exactly what they were doing when they published that article with that photo. They’re no strangers to the art of skeevy subtext.
pmarreck 4y ago
Just lost 17 lbs in 5 weeks on https://www.mounjaro.com/ https://www.mounjaro.com/, if it’s approved for general weight loss and not just prediabetics, would be a game-changer
stouset 4y ago
Anecdata of n = 1 but two weeks ago I was hospitalized due to a stroke (IA). I'm 38 years old, exercise vigorously for 10-12 hours per week, am a healthy weight for my height, have good blood pressure and cholesterol, and have zero known risk factors other than a COVID infection a bit under a year ago. I'm not ready to blame COVID just yet (we're still searching for an underlying cause) but my doctors and nurses all described a highly concerning uptick of strokes over the past few years, including for those like me who are generally in good health. I was lucky to have recovered with essentially no noticeable deficiencies, but many of those with similar stories I've spoken with in the weeks since weren't so lucky and have permanent impairment.
- barbazoo 4y ago
  That sounds terrifying, sorry that happened to you.
- el_benhameen 4y ago
  Really sorry to hear that. Thanks for sharing. Was it sudden onset or a slower process?
  - stouset 4y ago
    Sudden onset as far as I can tell. I woke up almost entirely unable to move anything on the right side of my body, and was only able to speak individual words with significant effort.
    - nomel 4y ago
      I had a mini stroke, with long lasting problems. Look up “dormant neurons” and hyperbaric oxygen therapy. I did a relatively extended treatment and it helped me tremendously. I really wish I would have done it sooner. I might have been able to save a bit more of my brain. Besides significant improvements in my work life, the big win for me was eliminating some anger problems that showed up after the TIA, and getting my sense of humor back! Considering my brain is my money maker, it was completely worth it (around $4k for 30 or 40 sessions, I believe). My TIA involved significant turbulence in my blood flow, so perhaps my capillaries were extra clogged, but you should seriously consider it, if you have any lingering changes. There are quite a few studies about it. The most promising I found involved Oxiracetam, so I included that, as part of my treatment (with my doctors approval, and proper choline supplementation).
mancerayder 4y ago
I'm not overweight, I'm a double-vaxxed, very athletic (weight training and running habits) and I got nailed hard on the post-acute sequalae front. Dry cough, shortness of breath lasted over two months. I had to completely stop strength training as it's a known risk factor for long covid-inspired problems like mitochondrial dysfunction and dysautonomia. I had the latter and it was a deeply existentially displeasurable experience. I got back into it not long ago and feel I've dodged a bullet, and learned a lot about how not to take health for granted.
nu11ptr 4y ago
It's worse than that: we are celebrating it Now I'm not saying we need to shame anyone, but saying "healthy at any size" is a terrible lie and in the long term helps no one.
- c54 4y ago
  “Healthy at any size” is a reasonable stance, and one in reaction to a medical system and social norm of being mean and hateful towards overweight people. BMI is not the only measure of health, but doctors will regularly tell heavyset patients with real other diseases to lose weight. Fat people are literally the only group where it’s just OK to make fun of them, in many circles. Even for those who are overweight and unhealthy, berating and shaming someone is never going to be a way to help someone heal.
  - ahtihn 4y ago
    Shaming works. There's nothing wrong with doctors telling overweight patients to lose weight. Because it is unhealthy.
    - onion2k 4y ago
      Shaming works. Why is obesity becoming more common when every doctor tells people to lose weight then?
      - wickedsickeune 4y ago
        It's obviously people who like being ashamed! /s
  - dclusin 4y ago
    It’s okay to shame smokers because they are hurting more than just themselves with second hand smoke. But it’s not okay to shame fat parents who let their kids get fat even tho that’s hurting others. The logical conclusion of what you’re asking for is absolving people of accountability for their poor life choices. People rightly and understandably vehemently disagree with this.
adgjlsfhk1 4y ago
imo, one of the biggest causes of obesity is calories in drinks. sodas, juices, and alcohol are all incredibly easy ways to add a few thousand calories per week to your diet without filing you up at all. milk is slightly better (but only because it naturally has a much smaller serving size).
- seeraan 4y ago
  Yes this is exactly right. I am obese. I am a tall guy who had been athletic most of my life until moving into the corporate world and spending most of my time at work at a desk. I dont' drink or smoke. I am still quite active on the weekends and weekdays. I am in Japan currently so I walk alot. But I've still been struggling for the past 8 years trying to lose weight and I even moved to Japan to try to put myself in an environment that generally has healthy food options. By FAR the biggest impact I've found on my weight is coca cola and other sugary type drinks. Unfortunately I am addicted to it and have a really hard time stopping. Right now I'm in a good spot, losing weight, and feeling pretty healthy and what helped immensely was Japan restaurants always having green tea and other healthy drink options so it could help me avoid drinking coke. I still love coke and I am always wanting that or dr. pepper or something similar. Whenever I go back to the US and go out to eat I really struggle finding drink options that are healthy and that I enjoy and its so easy to just order a soda. I imagine that are millions of people that are like me - generally healthy but because they drink coke or other sugary drinks on a regular basis they are killing themselves. I am pretty sure that the obesity situation won't go away if people are drinking sugary drinks all the time like I was. It was super difficult for me to stop in Japan even when I was away from that type of culture. Additionally there was another post here that I really agree with: "The good news is that maybe we got it backwards, in at least some of the cases[1]: > Higher fasting insulin and higher c-reactive protein confound the association between BMI and the risk of all-cause mortality. The increase in mortality that has been attributed to higher BMI is more likely due to hyperinsulinemia and inflammation rather than obesity." When COVID started I stopped going outside because of lockdowns and worry about my obesity and it really impacted my health. I started feeling much worse all the time because I wasn't' active and I became very sensitive to the food i was eating. I realized that my blood sugar was going all over the place depending on what I eat and I believe I had high levels of inflammation due to that. I then switched to a diet that balanced my blood sugar much more (Stopped eating pasta, or lots of bread, and other things that spike your blood sugar and switched to eating Kind Bars and mostly protein or green things when i felt hungry) and even before i started losing weight this made a huge difference in my standard of living and how I felt. I was still the same weight but my general health and concentration increased a lot and was one of the reasons I could start having energy to focus on losing weight.
timr 4y ago
Note that this appears to be the same CDC methodology that was found to be misleading in this Stat News piece (i.e. same site as this post) from 2021: https://www.statnews.com/2021/02/25/cdc-one-year-decline-life-expectancy-really-five-days/ https://www.statnews.com/2021/02/25/cdc-one-year-decline-lif... (it's literally the same publication from the CDC, just a year later) At that time, the CDC announced a dramatic decline in life expectancy by extrapolating one-year changes in death rates over the entire expected lifetime of someone born in 2020. This makes small differences look huge. But of course, that's not realistic at all -- we had a significant short-term change in certain age groups (mostly elderly). When you calculate the impact on life expectancy without assuming that every year after 2020 will look just like 2020, the change is only a few days.
ImaCake 4y ago
Age is a multiple times larger risk factor for COVID risk than weight. So while weight is important, the real elephant in the room is an ageing population?
- Bakary 4y ago
  Very few people refuse to talk about aging, and it's not a problem we are equipped to solve or something unfamiliar to us as a species. Plenty refuse to talk about rising obesity rates, and it's not only something we can address now but also a massive change (no pun intended) that has taken place in living memory.
rsanek 4y ago
damn, 4 literallys
blueprint 4y ago
literally
enw 4y ago
I wish our culture also stopped normalizing being fat.
davedx 4y ago
The article has figures backing up its claims. Do you have any evidence to support your statement that obesity/COVID have caused this decline in overall life expectancy? I wonder why this is the top voted comment
tallanvor 4y ago
Obesity can be an indicator of health, but I'd be careful about drawing the conclusion that obese people are dying at higher rates simply due to their weight. Being physically active looks to be more important than losing weight: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41366-022-01209-w https://www.nature.com/articles/s41366-022-01209-w When it comes to Covid, I'd bet on a physically active obese person having a better chance at survival over healthier looking people who aren't active, smoke, etc.
marginalia_nu 4y ago
If you want to see how ridiculously bad it's gotten, look up footage from streets and malls in the '70s and '80s. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YmWTHCHHzZY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YmWTHCHHzZY It's like not that there are fewer overweight people, they're virtually impossible to find. Today I feel like almost anywhere you look there are people with such problems it's affecting their gait. I don't think it's constructive to blame the people that have gotten fatter. It really doesn't add up that all these hundreds of millions of people collectively at the same time lost their resolve and and willpower. Seems far more convincing if there are environmental factors at play.
aembleton 4y ago
I've never been in a room with an elephant. Is this soemthing that happens to you a lot?
mercy_dude 4y ago
That’s an interesting point, I wonder how much of obesity is contributing factor to consuming fast food such as cola or sodas and burgers etc. because McDonalds were around even in the 70s. Or perhaps the obesity is propagating through genetic changes passed on from people who started consuming fast food at mass scale only after a generation or two?
ZeroGravitas 4y ago
Obesity is to health what nuclear is to the energy debate. A political side that: dislikes universal medicine dislikes decent city planning dislikes pollution controls dislikes regulating food advertising dislikes government health info dislikes taxing externalities like sugar dislikes regulating medicines dislikes harm reduction strategies for addiction dislikes wearing masks I could continue... really doesnt want to talk about those things that they are obviously and provably on the wrong side of. So they've convinced themselves that their political enemies are all saying "being clinically obese is politically correct" and therefore they can get really upset at them for the problem. Problem is, this is mostly not true. Their political enemies want to stop bullying, and victim blaming and people having body image issues because they don't look like a airbrushed Barbie doll or GI Joe on steroids. Which is good. Their take on that, presenting it as a threat to health, is just deflection, and while I'm sure they sucked in a few misinformed but well meaning people at first, it feels more and more desperate, more and more deliberate misdirection as time goes on. We have the web. We have access to academic journals. If the average software dev chooses to be misinformed on these topics then they're no better than a flat earther.
dominotw 4y ago
I believe obesity denial is actually a bigger problem than obesity itself. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32566758 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32566758

NovaVeles 4y ago

The big wake up call for me was a few years earlier. I had just hit 130Kg (285+ pounds) and I had just had enough of it all! By the time I had COVID earlier this year I was down to around 90Kg (198 pounds) - I get the feeling that helped out immensely compared with how I used to be. Vaccines also did their part combined with the lessening impacts of the various variants. The other thing that got brought to my attention was an off handed comment about various health issues that are impacting populations. Things like declining fertility and increasing health issues almost always correlate more with obesity rather than the environmental factors. Yes, correlation is not causation but it does seem at fairly plausible. For example could things like micro plastics be doing these things? Yes. But one would expect these to be near global - yet the impacts are felt mostly in obese nations. It could potentially be a threat multiplier however.

strken 4y ago
The rise in obesity is likely environmental. It's entirely possible that microplastics or PFAS (or whatever contaminant you want to point the finger at) causes obesity, which then causes health issues.
- Bakary 4y ago
  It's fairly obvious when you travel to places with high obesity that the problem is environmental, but microplastics aren't even going to be in the top 20 reasons for that. The food culture in those places is just completely busted. You can sense it even in layovers at US airports.
- acdha 4y ago
  It’s lifestyle: Americans lead the world in both obesity and car centric lifestyles, and we have a ton of reinforcing factors – suburbs designed around cars are unpleasant/unsafe to be active in, people eat unhealthy food because it’s cheap (cars and suburbs are both more expensive) and something they can eat in the car or pickup on the way home, kids are prevented from exercising because there are few safe places in their neighborhoods, etc. Americans who live in walkable settings are healthier on average but it’s not like they aren’t exposed to the same chemicals as their suburban counterparts.
  - nightski 4y ago
    Suburbs are very walkable. You don't always have to have a destination to walk to. My wife & I walk every night for an hour and enjoy observing our neighborhood.
    - tdeck 4y ago
      It's nice that the suburb you lived in is enjoyable to walk in, but that's not what the word "walkable" means in the context of a neighborhood. Walkable means you can accomplish daily tasks by using walking as a mode of transportation, not just a form of leisure. To address your main point, many US suburbs are not safe to walk in. Many suburbs lack things like sidewalks, crosswalks, and traffic signals for pedestrians because pedestrians are a complete afterthought. Other places have a sidewalk but no shade, or are by roads with loud high-speed traffic so they're not pleasant to walk in. I've lived in all of these kinds of places and it really affects your willingness to walk anywhere.
      - nightski 4y ago
        That's too bad. In the area around where I live I have yet to encounter a suburb that doesn't have sidewalks! I understand what you meant by "walkability". I also don't think it's fun or practical. I tend to visit a lot of different stores, not just one or two. But I only go out shopping once a week or two, not daily. That sounds exhausting. I also hate super dense living being packed in like sardines with everyone else. It's nice having a house with a decent sized yard and 10+ trees. Plenty of space and isolation, but at the same time close enough to friendly neighbors to socialize with. More Americans should give small to mid size cities a chance. They have a lot to offer. Far cheaper too, our neighborhood definitely isn't wealthy.

Waterluvian 4y ago

Doesn’t obesity put one at greater risk for basically everything? Or is Covid exceptionally harmful to the obese for some reason?

marcosdumay 4y ago
Covid is exceptionally harmful to the obese for some reason. That's well known since 2020, but I don't thinkg anybody knows the reason.

butwhywhyoh 4y ago

You used the word literally four times in your post, and even twice in one sentence. What's the fascination with this word? It seems to be used to add completely unneeded emphasis, rather than anything resembling its original definition.

serf 4y ago
it's a regionally-biased twitch filler word, like like, that happens to have a functional value of adding emphasis. just filter it out. we all have certain ways that we bias our communications. I certainly do.
quickthrower2 4y ago
Probably trying to convey emotion/emphasis through plain text.

jldugger 4y ago

The good news is that maybe we got it backwards, in at least some of the cases[1]: > Higher fasting insulin and higher c-reactive protein confound the association between BMI and the risk of all-cause mortality. The increase in mortality that has been attributed to higher BMI is more likely due to hyperinsulinemia and inflammation rather than obesity. [1]: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41366-022-01211-2 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41366-022-01211-2

losteric 4y ago
> The increase in mortality that has been attributed to higher BMI is more likely due to hyperinsulinemia and inflammation rather than obesity Not sure I understand this sentencen. Are they saying hyperinsulinemia and inflammation are independent of obesity? Both symptoms of <X>?
- orwin 4y ago
  What i understood (this is quite new and i haven't had time to research this): Some nutritionists and medical practitioner think that most obesity (the >35BMI kind) are caused by hormones (some gland inflammation, like i said i didn't researched this) or prediabetes. Hence why European immigrants are not hit the same as natives in the US, as phylogenetic have quite an impact on hormones production. This was an old theory and some recent research proved that at least it needs to be investigated more seriously. In general hormones effect on human development, while being quite an active field, seems to be still underfunded or at least more ignored than it should be.

quickthrower2 4y ago

Low carb diet helped me with this. Calories in calories out, but if you have a lot of carbs you are going to get hungry when restricting the calories, whereas on a low carb diet I sometimes have to think hard as to whether I have had breakfast or not by 10am. Having woke up at 7am. "Oh I should probably eat something..." I think I have less than 50g of carbs a day, and probably 1500 calories but I don't track it too closely. I also do strength, but a little each day and make it incidental. I might play with the TRX or do a few pull up or dips at the park while the dogs are off leash. Something that makes it easier is there are low carb treats and drinks. It does mean taking in more alcohol (as in chemically an alcohol, not ethanol) based sweeteners, so I worry about that a little. For someone who doesn't go out much this is easy, but in your younger years with social pressure it might take a lot of will power, and even changing your friends and breaking up with partners and so forth to support this kind of habit, since it goes counter to the average person's culture in the west. Especially quitting alcohol too.

strken 4y ago
A lot of success in fixing your diet comes from experimenting and seeing what works for you. Low carb can help some people, while particular carb-heavy but satiating foods like oats or potatoes can help others. I don't think it's always clear-cut.
- quickthrower2 4y ago
  I agree. Everyone needs to be their own doctor, because they have an intuition for their own body. (Dieting is being your own doctor by the way!)
- prmoustache 4y ago
  Additionnally, regardless of the diet a key is to relearn to eat slowly. By eating too fast we tend to feel satiated too late.
SOLAR_FIELDS 4y ago
Quitting alcohol and going to OMAD (one meal a day) helped me lose 20 kilos in < 2 months. And I wasn’t even obese, that was straight from overweight to goal weight. Alcohol is an enormous contributor to weight for several different reasons. Plus, the weight you get as a drinker (the “hard” fat) is the worst kind of fat your body can have.

remarkEon 4y ago

Hear, hear. One of the greatest failings of our "modern" healthcare system is that there's no plan to address this crisis. Obesity is the gateway to what seems like an infinite amount of health complications - not to mention the additional burden on the health care system itself when they get sick. I fully acknowledge that it's a difficult subject, it upsets people, and it's uncomfortable. The greatest healthcare advice our leaders can give us right now is for everyone to exercise a little more and lost a little weight. Isn't this the perfect time for that? We're coming out of a pandemic and we have the actual data that showed that obese people were uniquely susceptible to bad outcomes from this disease.

midoridensha 4y ago
>One of the greatest failings of our "modern" healthcare system is that there's no plan to address this crisis. Obesity is the gateway to what seems like an infinite amount of health complications What are they supposed to do? Obesity is caused by American's terrible lifestyle. Healthcare systems can only do so much to compensate for a bad lifestyle. Stop drinking alcohol, and start walking everywhere instead of driving.
- remarkEon 4y ago
  >Healthcare systems can only do so much to compensate for a bad lifestyle. And this right here is my problem. Healthcare doesn't only begin when you get to the doctor or the hospital. There's no reason that healthcare officials/leaders/experts/whatever can't recommend baseline levels of fitness for Americans, and provide help for getting to that standard. I don't know, maybe Healthcare plans should include subsidies for gym memberships by law.
  - j-bos 4y ago
    This would be a beautiful dream
  - barbazoo 4y ago
    Imagine what half the population would say if an expert or an authority started telling people to walk more, eat less and eat better.

fortran77 4y ago

I'm always amazed that few people want to talk about this. Early on in the pandemic, the NY Times acted shocked, shocked that 7 members of this family all died from COVID https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/18/nyregion/new-jersey-family-coronavirus.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/18/nyregion/new-jersey-famil... As you said, nobody dared mention the 7 elephants in the room. In fact, the Times said: > "But the virus’s devastating toll on a single family is considered as rare as it is perplexing."

morsch 4y ago
Seven people were infected, four died.
TechBro8615 4y ago
NYT editors knew exactly what they were doing when they published that article with that photo. They’re no strangers to the art of skeevy subtext.

pmarreck 4y ago

Just lost 17 lbs in 5 weeks on https://www.mounjaro.com/ https://www.mounjaro.com/, if it’s approved for general weight loss and not just prediabetics, would be a game-changer

stouset 4y ago

Anecdata of n = 1 but two weeks ago I was hospitalized due to a stroke (IA). I'm 38 years old, exercise vigorously for 10-12 hours per week, am a healthy weight for my height, have good blood pressure and cholesterol, and have zero known risk factors other than a COVID infection a bit under a year ago. I'm not ready to blame COVID just yet (we're still searching for an underlying cause) but my doctors and nurses all described a highly concerning uptick of strokes over the past few years, including for those like me who are generally in good health. I was lucky to have recovered with essentially no noticeable deficiencies, but many of those with similar stories I've spoken with in the weeks since weren't so lucky and have permanent impairment.

barbazoo 4y ago
That sounds terrifying, sorry that happened to you.
el_benhameen 4y ago
Really sorry to hear that. Thanks for sharing. Was it sudden onset or a slower process?
- stouset 4y ago
  Sudden onset as far as I can tell. I woke up almost entirely unable to move anything on the right side of my body, and was only able to speak individual words with significant effort.
  - nomel 4y ago
    I had a mini stroke, with long lasting problems. Look up “dormant neurons” and hyperbaric oxygen therapy. I did a relatively extended treatment and it helped me tremendously. I really wish I would have done it sooner. I might have been able to save a bit more of my brain. Besides significant improvements in my work life, the big win for me was eliminating some anger problems that showed up after the TIA, and getting my sense of humor back! Considering my brain is my money maker, it was completely worth it (around $4k for 30 or 40 sessions, I believe). My TIA involved significant turbulence in my blood flow, so perhaps my capillaries were extra clogged, but you should seriously consider it, if you have any lingering changes. There are quite a few studies about it. The most promising I found involved Oxiracetam, so I included that, as part of my treatment (with my doctors approval, and proper choline supplementation).

mancerayder 4y ago

I'm not overweight, I'm a double-vaxxed, very athletic (weight training and running habits) and I got nailed hard on the post-acute sequalae front. Dry cough, shortness of breath lasted over two months. I had to completely stop strength training as it's a known risk factor for long covid-inspired problems like mitochondrial dysfunction and dysautonomia. I had the latter and it was a deeply existentially displeasurable experience. I got back into it not long ago and feel I've dodged a bullet, and learned a lot about how not to take health for granted.

nu11ptr 4y ago

It's worse than that: we are celebrating it Now I'm not saying we need to shame anyone, but saying "healthy at any size" is a terrible lie and in the long term helps no one.

c54 4y ago
“Healthy at any size” is a reasonable stance, and one in reaction to a medical system and social norm of being mean and hateful towards overweight people. BMI is not the only measure of health, but doctors will regularly tell heavyset patients with real other diseases to lose weight. Fat people are literally the only group where it’s just OK to make fun of them, in many circles. Even for those who are overweight and unhealthy, berating and shaming someone is never going to be a way to help someone heal.
- ahtihn 4y ago
  Shaming works. There's nothing wrong with doctors telling overweight patients to lose weight. Because it is unhealthy.
  - onion2k 4y ago
    Shaming works. Why is obesity becoming more common when every doctor tells people to lose weight then?
    - wickedsickeune 4y ago
      It's obviously people who like being ashamed! /s
- dclusin 4y ago
  It’s okay to shame smokers because they are hurting more than just themselves with second hand smoke. But it’s not okay to shame fat parents who let their kids get fat even tho that’s hurting others. The logical conclusion of what you’re asking for is absolving people of accountability for their poor life choices. People rightly and understandably vehemently disagree with this.

adgjlsfhk1 4y ago

imo, one of the biggest causes of obesity is calories in drinks. sodas, juices, and alcohol are all incredibly easy ways to add a few thousand calories per week to your diet without filing you up at all. milk is slightly better (but only because it naturally has a much smaller serving size).

seeraan 4y ago
Yes this is exactly right. I am obese. I am a tall guy who had been athletic most of my life until moving into the corporate world and spending most of my time at work at a desk. I dont' drink or smoke. I am still quite active on the weekends and weekdays. I am in Japan currently so I walk alot. But I've still been struggling for the past 8 years trying to lose weight and I even moved to Japan to try to put myself in an environment that generally has healthy food options. By FAR the biggest impact I've found on my weight is coca cola and other sugary type drinks. Unfortunately I am addicted to it and have a really hard time stopping. Right now I'm in a good spot, losing weight, and feeling pretty healthy and what helped immensely was Japan restaurants always having green tea and other healthy drink options so it could help me avoid drinking coke. I still love coke and I am always wanting that or dr. pepper or something similar. Whenever I go back to the US and go out to eat I really struggle finding drink options that are healthy and that I enjoy and its so easy to just order a soda. I imagine that are millions of people that are like me - generally healthy but because they drink coke or other sugary drinks on a regular basis they are killing themselves. I am pretty sure that the obesity situation won't go away if people are drinking sugary drinks all the time like I was. It was super difficult for me to stop in Japan even when I was away from that type of culture. Additionally there was another post here that I really agree with: "The good news is that maybe we got it backwards, in at least some of the cases[1]: > Higher fasting insulin and higher c-reactive protein confound the association between BMI and the risk of all-cause mortality. The increase in mortality that has been attributed to higher BMI is more likely due to hyperinsulinemia and inflammation rather than obesity." When COVID started I stopped going outside because of lockdowns and worry about my obesity and it really impacted my health. I started feeling much worse all the time because I wasn't' active and I became very sensitive to the food i was eating. I realized that my blood sugar was going all over the place depending on what I eat and I believe I had high levels of inflammation due to that. I then switched to a diet that balanced my blood sugar much more (Stopped eating pasta, or lots of bread, and other things that spike your blood sugar and switched to eating Kind Bars and mostly protein or green things when i felt hungry) and even before i started losing weight this made a huge difference in my standard of living and how I felt. I was still the same weight but my general health and concentration increased a lot and was one of the reasons I could start having energy to focus on losing weight.

timr 4y ago

Note that this appears to be the same CDC methodology that was found to be misleading in this Stat News piece (i.e. same site as this post) from 2021: https://www.statnews.com/2021/02/25/cdc-one-year-decline-life-expectancy-really-five-days/ https://www.statnews.com/2021/02/25/cdc-one-year-decline-lif... (it's literally the same publication from the CDC, just a year later) At that time, the CDC announced a dramatic decline in life expectancy by extrapolating one-year changes in death rates over the entire expected lifetime of someone born in 2020. This makes small differences look huge. But of course, that's not realistic at all -- we had a significant short-term change in certain age groups (mostly elderly). When you calculate the impact on life expectancy without assuming that every year after 2020 will look just like 2020, the change is only a few days.

ImaCake 4y ago

Age is a multiple times larger risk factor for COVID risk than weight. So while weight is important, the real elephant in the room is an ageing population?

Bakary 4y ago
Very few people refuse to talk about aging, and it's not a problem we are equipped to solve or something unfamiliar to us as a species. Plenty refuse to talk about rising obesity rates, and it's not only something we can address now but also a massive change (no pun intended) that has taken place in living memory.

rsanek 4y ago

damn, 4 literallys

blueprint 4y ago

literally

enw 4y ago

I wish our culture also stopped normalizing being fat.

davedx 4y ago

The article has figures backing up its claims. Do you have any evidence to support your statement that obesity/COVID have caused this decline in overall life expectancy? I wonder why this is the top voted comment

tallanvor 4y ago

Obesity can be an indicator of health, but I'd be careful about drawing the conclusion that obese people are dying at higher rates simply due to their weight. Being physically active looks to be more important than losing weight: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41366-022-01209-w https://www.nature.com/articles/s41366-022-01209-w When it comes to Covid, I'd bet on a physically active obese person having a better chance at survival over healthier looking people who aren't active, smoke, etc.

marginalia_nu 4y ago

If you want to see how ridiculously bad it's gotten, look up footage from streets and malls in the '70s and '80s. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YmWTHCHHzZY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YmWTHCHHzZY It's like not that there are fewer overweight people, they're virtually impossible to find. Today I feel like almost anywhere you look there are people with such problems it's affecting their gait. I don't think it's constructive to blame the people that have gotten fatter. It really doesn't add up that all these hundreds of millions of people collectively at the same time lost their resolve and and willpower. Seems far more convincing if there are environmental factors at play.

aembleton 4y ago

I've never been in a room with an elephant. Is this soemthing that happens to you a lot?

mercy_dude 4y ago

That’s an interesting point, I wonder how much of obesity is contributing factor to consuming fast food such as cola or sodas and burgers etc. because McDonalds were around even in the 70s. Or perhaps the obesity is propagating through genetic changes passed on from people who started consuming fast food at mass scale only after a generation or two?

ZeroGravitas 4y ago

Obesity is to health what nuclear is to the energy debate. A political side that: dislikes universal medicine dislikes decent city planning dislikes pollution controls dislikes regulating food advertising dislikes government health info dislikes taxing externalities like sugar dislikes regulating medicines dislikes harm reduction strategies for addiction dislikes wearing masks I could continue... really doesnt want to talk about those things that they are obviously and provably on the wrong side of. So they've convinced themselves that their political enemies are all saying "being clinically obese is politically correct" and therefore they can get really upset at them for the problem. Problem is, this is mostly not true. Their political enemies want to stop bullying, and victim blaming and people having body image issues because they don't look like a airbrushed Barbie doll or GI Joe on steroids. Which is good. Their take on that, presenting it as a threat to health, is just deflection, and while I'm sure they sucked in a few misinformed but well meaning people at first, it feels more and more desperate, more and more deliberate misdirection as time goes on. We have the web. We have access to academic journals. If the average software dev chooses to be misinformed on these topics then they're no better than a flat earther.

dominotw 4y ago

I believe obesity denial is actually a bigger problem than obesity itself. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32566758 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32566758