This cannot become our new Normal

Let’s stop making substandard medical care a new normal. None of this is okay.

Weight is not beauty. This is a hill I will die on.

When weight impacts health, it is not aesthetics. It is a disease. A disease associated with over 200 complications.

We need to stop normalising any conversation that discusses obesity as cosmetic.

We need to stop treating these trending drugs like cures for a chronic disease. The drugs have an important part to play in whole-person, evidence-based care. But we need to stop pretending it is an acceptable standard of care to skip the usual steps in safe patient care – pill mills with no in-person checks, no safety bloods aren’t a solution to anything except sales and dividends.

We need to stop making it okay for commercial companies to start short-term treatments for chronic, long-term medical conditions.

We need to stop normalising patient care that does not include checking patients for complications from their obesity, such as sleep apnoea or liver disease that can be silent and have real long-term effects on their health.

Patients deserve and need life long, ongoing competent medical care that includes qualified dietetics – not partnered enrollment in commerical slimming clubs.

And we need to stop normalising the growing number of services exploiting the lack of access to qualified care and weight stigma in society to get a chunk of the market.

Patients need and deserve better access to care – not exploitation or short cuts.