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As a counter point to that, my wife and I recently moved from the USA to the UK and we've spent more time at the doctor's in the past month than we had in the p

As a counter point to that, my wife and I recently moved from the USA to the UK and we've spent more time at the doctor's in the past month than we had in the previous year in the USA. Part of the difference is that, in the UK, the doctors have been treating my wife's problems as honest medical problems and not just beating the diet and exercise drumbeat regularly. My wife spent a good part of the last year essentially bed ridden. The US doctor performed test after test to find out what was wrong. She eventually prescribed some medication for my wife which made her violently ill, but the doctor promised her body would acclimate to the medicine and that, in a few months, she's be able to walk again. Since coming to the UK, we've discovered that the battery of blood tests that were performed back in the USA was actually just the diabetes test being performed over and over again because the test kept coming back negative. The medicine prescribed was actually a drug for the treatment of diabetics, despite the doctor having twelve negative blood tests on my wife for diabetes. Instead, the UK doctor considered the possibility that there was something wrong with my wife besides just being fat. After a week on her new medicine, she was starting to walk without a cane again. In the past two months, she's lost thirty pounds. It's amazing how much more exercise you can get when you're not bedridden. Next week, we're seeing a GI doctor because the UK doctor realized that A) my wife would lose more weight if she ate more salad, B) my wife would eat more salad if she didn't always violently vomit it back up six hours later, and C) regurgitating food eaten more than fours hours ago isn't normal. The doctors in the USA never could seem to figure out B and C, so they would just double down on A. By the way, in case you think that it was just that one doctor, that's not even our worst experience with it. About a decade back, my wife went to the emergency room after getting stabbed. The nurse told her the the problem would go away with diet and exercise. A stab wound. Thankfully, she caused enough of a scene to get a second opinion and the STITCHES that normally accompany stab wounds.

eli_gottlieb 12y ago
You know, I've heard the term fat-shaming, but that is a pretty damn extreme example. A stab wound was blamed on being fat?
- king_jester 12y ago
  These kinds of things are very common for fat people. A lot of sites and forums that are frequented by fat people tell these kinds of stories. This is Thin Privilege[1] is a popular one on tumblr where people mostly submit their stories about being treated negatively for being fat and quite a lot of those stories revolve around medical and mental health care in ways that are quite horrifying. [1] http://thisisthinprivilege.tumblr.com/ http://thisisthinprivilege.tumblr.com/
  - matthewmacleod 12y ago
    Don't promote this appalling nonsense, please. This is a site which actively promotes the idea that being overweight is healthy – which it is not. I agree that it can be really easy to blame health problems on weight when there are more complex issues present, and the idea of blaming a stab wound on obesity is obviously ludicrous. That said, being overweight is almost always extremely unhealthy and a major cause of many illnesses. It's absolutely correct that there should be a lot of focus on that.
    - king_jester 12y ago
      > being overweight is almost always extremely unhealthy and a major cause of many illnesses This is not true whatsoever. Weight and health have only limited correlations, to say that being overweight means you are unhealthy is ludicrous. This is well studied and known.
      - rgejman 12y ago
        This is just not true. Being overweight or obese significantly increases all cause mortality. Here's a study where they followed 527,265 people for 10 years: http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa055643#t=articleResults http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa055643#t=articleR... "During a maximum follow-up of 10 years through 2005, 61,317 participants (42,173 men and 19,144 women) died. Initial analyses showed an increased risk of death for the highest and lowest categories of BMI among both men and women, in all racial or ethnic groups, and at all ages. When the analysis was restricted to healthy people who had never smoked, the risk of death was associated with both overweight and obesity among men and women. In analyses of BMI during midlife (age of 50 years) among those who had never smoked, the associations became stronger, with the risk of death increasing by 20 to 40 percent among overweight persons and by two to at least three times among obese persons; the risk of death among underweight persons was attenuated."

eli_gottlieb 12y ago

You know, I've heard the term fat-shaming, but that is a pretty damn extreme example. A stab wound was blamed on being fat?

king_jester 12y ago
These kinds of things are very common for fat people. A lot of sites and forums that are frequented by fat people tell these kinds of stories. This is Thin Privilege[1] is a popular one on tumblr where people mostly submit their stories about being treated negatively for being fat and quite a lot of those stories revolve around medical and mental health care in ways that are quite horrifying. [1] http://thisisthinprivilege.tumblr.com/ http://thisisthinprivilege.tumblr.com/
- matthewmacleod 12y ago
  Don't promote this appalling nonsense, please. This is a site which actively promotes the idea that being overweight is healthy – which it is not. I agree that it can be really easy to blame health problems on weight when there are more complex issues present, and the idea of blaming a stab wound on obesity is obviously ludicrous. That said, being overweight is almost always extremely unhealthy and a major cause of many illnesses. It's absolutely correct that there should be a lot of focus on that.
  - king_jester 12y ago
    > being overweight is almost always extremely unhealthy and a major cause of many illnesses This is not true whatsoever. Weight and health have only limited correlations, to say that being overweight means you are unhealthy is ludicrous. This is well studied and known.
    - rgejman 12y ago
      This is just not true. Being overweight or obese significantly increases all cause mortality. Here's a study where they followed 527,265 people for 10 years: http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa055643#t=articleResults http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa055643#t=articleR... "During a maximum follow-up of 10 years through 2005, 61,317 participants (42,173 men and 19,144 women) died. Initial analyses showed an increased risk of death for the highest and lowest categories of BMI among both men and women, in all racial or ethnic groups, and at all ages. When the analysis was restricted to healthy people who had never smoked, the risk of death was associated with both overweight and obesity among men and women. In analyses of BMI during midlife (age of 50 years) among those who had never smoked, the associations became stronger, with the risk of death increasing by 20 to 40 percent among overweight persons and by two to at least three times among obese persons; the risk of death among underweight persons was attenuated."