Does fatphobia exist?

Many activists fighting fatphobia on the Internet claim that obesity is not a disease. They say that obesity is a risk factor.

Obesity is indeed a risk factor for developing many diseases and health problems (high blood pressure, metabolic syndrome, type 2 diabetes, 13 types of cancer, etc., etc., etc.).

But, is it true that it’s not a disease?

Let’s see what the scientific evidence says:

Obesity is a highly prevalent chronic disease characterized by excessive fat accumulation or distribution that presents a risk to health and requires lifelong care.

The Obesity Society

Obesity is a chronic, progressive and relapsing disease, characterized by the presence of abnormal or excess adiposity that impairs health and social well-being.

Obesity Canada

Obesity is a complex disease involving having too much body fat

Mayo Clinic

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDCs), obesity is a common, serious, and costly chronic disease of adults and children.

But, what happens in obesity?

An increase in the size and amount of fat cells in the body. (NIH)

And, what is a disease? An abnormal condition that affects the structure or function of part or all of the body and is usually associated with specific signs and symptoms (National Cancer Institute).

Meaning, something that goes wrong in your body and that we can measure. Sometimes a disease is called a pathology or disorder. Some examples of diseases are multiple sclerosis, the flu, measles and Covid-19.

On the other hand, a risk factor is like buying lottery tickets for something bad to happen. For example, smoking, drinking alcohol or having a sunbathe without sun cream.

All right, I have tortured you already with some definitions.

Now, how do we know if a person has a body fat excess?

So far, health professionals used the BMI, Body Mass Index, to determine if a person had obesity or not. But for years, we’ve known that this isn’t very reliable because some people can have a high BMI but not have fat excess, for example, bodybuilders.

I don’t want to talk about weight, height and body fat percentages in this post, so we are gonna let that aside.

The important part, is how to prevent obesity from happening:

Healthy Eating: Rich in veggies (vegetables, legumes, fruits), substituting white bread, white pasta and white flour for whole grain alternatives and avoiding sugary food and ultra-processed food such as fast food or sodas.

Engage in daily physical exercise: If you have to start with the typical “I go for walks in the evenings,” that’s great! But start. And from there, try to gradually incorporate more exercise like running, weightlifting…

Take care of our gut microbiota: By doing the rest of the things on this list, you take pretty good care of the bugs in your gut. But also, you can include in your diet probiotics. Easy: Yogurt and kefir.

Take care of your mental health: If you’re less anxious, stressed… it’s less likely that you’ll start snacking on junk food.

Breastfeeding: Breastfeeding has proved to prevent overweight and obesity both in mum and baby.

Try to sleep well.

Avoid alcohol.

A mom’s trick: If you don’t buy it, you don’t eat it. If you don’t bring home junk food from the shop it would be way easier not to eat it. 🙂

In obesity, there are many things related. That’s why this is such a complex disease: biological, psychological, and social factors. From the place where you live, if you work a night shift, how you commute, your preferences, your genetics, your family, your mental health, your guts, a million factors… That’s the reason it is a multifactorial disease.

Let’s get to the why of this article.

The journal The Lancet published just a few months ago an article in which they alert that obesity prevalence (the number of people suffering a certain disease in a given moment) from 1990 to 2022 has increased in women in 188 countries, and in men in all the studied countries (197 countries).

According to this study, in 2022 there were 504 MILLION women and 374 MILLION men worldwide with obesity. Also, 'the number of girls and boys with obesity in 2022 was 65,1 million y 94,2 million respectively.

Explain how obesity works, how it happens, its risk factors … would be way too long for a post. With this article I just want you to know 2 things. That obesity is a huge worldwide public health problem and how to prevent it.

But I already have obesity, how do I solve it?

Ask for help. Obesity is very complex and its treatment must be personalized. It depends on if you have another disease, your age, your working shifts, your family situation, the things you like, your mental health…

First, you need to ask for help to your GP. And, if you can pay for it, attend to a nutritionist consultation and a specialized psychologist.

Psychologist? I am not crazy.

Our mental health and obesity are really, really close. Our emotions, our thoughts…

Warning: If the nutritionist or health professional keeps asking you to check your weight every week or every 2 weeks RUN AWAY.

And, to answer the question in this article title…

We’ve said already that obesity is very bad and so on but, in the end, people with obesity are… people. AND YES, FATFHOBIA EXISTS.

In medical or academic words it is called weight stigma, and it has been scientifically proven that it hurts people suffering from obesity, their health and their treatment.

People with overweight or obesity are often labelled as lazy, lacking willpower… They are accused of being guilty of having obesity. Society has many prejudices and stereotypes against people with this disease and that can lead to mental health problems and lack of working opportunities. I leave more info on that in the references.

And, is not necessary to look for what institutions or scientific societies say, we just have to check the social media profiles of people with overweight or obesity and see the comments that some people write in their posts, mostly in the case of activists against fatphobia. Insults, threats…

Besides, in their daily lives, many people suffer from it. One example, and that’s one of the worst, happens in medical consultations. Many people with overweight or obesity attend the consultation because they have something like problems with their period, back pain, or difficulty breathing and, without any diagnostic test to check if there is something else, the first thing they are told is to lose weight.

Having said that, I don’t agree with some of the things that many activists against weight stigma say. Let me explain. For example, you have to love yourself and accept your body, no matter the shape, but that doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t try to improve your health by losing weight and body fat excess. That’s not fatphobic.