Is
Obesity a disease? Yes, says the world’s largest medical
body the “American Medical Association (AMA). AMA has
recognized obesity as a disease in its annual Chicago meet
recently overriding a study committee’s recommendation
to not to do so.
Obesity is usually determined by
one's body mass index (BMI), a measure of body fat based on
ones height and weight. A BMI of 30 or higher is considered
obese while a BMI of 25 to 29.9 is considered overweight.
Dr. Abayomi Akanji, professor of
medical sciences at the Frank H. Netter MD School of Medicine
at Quinnipiac University in Hamden says that this AMA’s
decision is long overdue.
Whether obesity should be called
a disease has been a debatable subject for long and the Obesity
Society in 2008 itself had issued its support for classifying
obesity as a disease, says Morgan Downey, publisher of the
online Downey Obesity Report.
The Internal Revenue Service had
said that obesity treatments can qualify for tax deductions.
However, in 2004, Medicare removed “obesity” from
its coverage manual saying obesity was not a disease. Now
a day after this AMA's decision, U.S. lawmakers introduced
bipartisan bills that would necessitate Medicare to cover
more obesity treatments and medications.
Doctors and other obesity experts
feel this decision will motivate insurers to cover weight
loss interventions like counseling, medications or surgery.
Daniel Davis, chief of bariatric surgeons at Stamford Hospital's
Center for Surgical Weight Loss says presently most policies
don’t cover these, but now the situation will change
since obesity is officially considered a disease and patients
can access proven treatment. Donna Tommelleo, spokeswoman
for the Connecticut Insurance Department, says that Bariatric
surgery is not typically covered under individual and group
plans and it will take some time for the legislative process
to make it a covered benefit.
Patrice Harris, an AMA board member
says "recognizing obesity as a disease will help change
the way the medical community tackles this complex issue that
affects approximately 1 in 3 Americans and the AMA is committed
to improving health outcomes and is working to reduce the
incidence of cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes that
are often linked to obesity." However, according to Marlene
Schwartz, director of Yale University's Rudd Center for Food
Policy and Obesity, there are some people who have a BMI of
30, but eat a good diet, are physically active and extremely
fit, who cannot be otherwise considered obese and are not
at any risk for obesity-related health problems. Now these
people are being told they have a disease. Already, some opine
that BMI itself is an incorrect measurement of obesity, as
it doesn't actually measure the fat, but calculates fat based
on ones height and weight.
Anyway, the overall scenario is
that most people have taken the AMA's decision as a positive
step, including Karen Novak, outpatient nutrition educator
at St. Vincent's Medical Center in Bridgeport, who says, often
doctors will only ask obese patient with health problems to
lose weight, without offering any kind of constructive solutions,
but now physicians will need to improve their focus.
Watch the informational Video: Obesity in America!
Too much food?
Image credit:www.uwosh.edu
“More die in the United
States of too much food than of too little”
- John Kenneth Galbraith
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