It is increasingly a topic in the consulting room: obesity. ‘You are actually overweight and that is not healthy. It can make you sick. Do you want help with losing weight?’ Not everyone is happy with this doctor’s meddling in weight. What do you think about that?
Agree: the doctor must help against the obesity epidemic
Overweight is an important risk factor in diseases such as diabetes, osteoarthritis, sleep apnea, cardiovascular disease, not to mention covid-19. It’s good that doctors are paying more attention to this these days. The doctor can immediately refer you to personal help with weight loss. This can be a dietician, but also a lifestyle coach who is reimbursed.
Actually, it is strange that the doctor should not say anything about it, if overweight is indeed so important for our health. We also find it normal for the doctor to address patients about smoking or excessive alcohol consumption. More than half of the Dutch population is now overweight, it is even referred to as the obesity epidemic. In the long run, this leads to a lot of extra healthcare costs, which we all contribute to. It’s good that doctors point out the dangers of being overweight and offer help.
Disagree: that is not the role of the doctor, but of politics
The fact that half of the Dutch are overweight cannot be solved with a doctor’s warning. That makes it an individual problem (‘you eat too much and you exercise too little, do something about it’), while losing weight is terribly difficult. If so many people fail to lose weight, you are not speaking of personal failure, but of a social problem.
We are tempted in the street with donuts, pizza and fries. Most ready-made products in the supermarket are too greasy and too salty. The healthy products are more expensive than the unhealthy ones. The government can intervene with a sugar tax, abolish VAT on fruit and vegetables, free water taps and the construction of cycling and walking routes. But that happens far too infrequently.
In addition – you should always be able to ask the doctor for help. Whether you are fat, smoke or use heroin, so to speak. If the doctor starts pointing the finger, the doctor’s office is no longer a safe place.
Want to read more about this issue? NRC wrote an interesting article with cardiologist Janneke Wittekoek and Volkskrant columnist and activist Asha ten Broeke. Read the article here.
Statement: ‘The doctor may tell a patient that he is too fat.’
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