Should a cure for obesity overtake a cure for cancer in scientists efforts.
 

:shrug:

600 million people are obese worldwide, due to all kinds of things.

Cancer comes in all sorts of ways, but some are incurable.

Cure for obesity?

Diets exist.

Absolutely not

Many cases are caused by mental issues and health issues.

No there is no cure for gluttony.

It's worth more of a debate than that...

This year there will be 18.7 million more cases of cancer diagnosed worldwide.

Then their efforts are better focussed on those causes of obesity, the effects of mental health go above and beyond "obesity".

More cancers are caused by obesity than by smoking apparently so yes something needs to be done by food manufacturers, diet companies and us ourselves.

They could spend more money into what links mental health and obesity..

Plus you have the drain on the NHS from obesity compared to cancer, I don't have figures but it will be higher for obesity in 10 on 20 years time if we don't tackle it properly....Cancer has been identified as early as the 18th century in chimney sweeps scrotums yet we still don't have a cure!

Have you ever seen a you tube vid called 'dear fat people'? It's got a few good tips in

Js, I’m “obese” and I rarely eat. My weight ballooned from necessary anti-depressant medication. So “gluttony” doesn’t always come into it.

I went to my GP for advice about weight loss on said medication and he was actually gobsmacked with my food diary I had to make. I basically should be eating about 3000 calories a day but I rarely hit 1000.

I did not know that..I was led to believe smoking was by the Internet.

The food companies and the government need to take a long hard look at themselves...what I would do is change this sin tax thing that they put on sugar cause that doesn't help the poor at all..what I would do is give out tokens to the poor so they can by all the healthy stuff at the same price...the government can pick up the shortfall for the companies...cause I'm sure everything they have said and promised about healthy eating will instantly go out the window when I mention that to them...


So that's the poor sorted...

There will always be anomalies. .. in 99% of cases it's overeating, snacking, fizzy drinks and not moving around enough...I yoyo, at this moment I'm obese and it's my fault, I don't meal prep like I used to and snack at work or get take out.

Thank you for your honesty..

There must be a way to make better medication for you if the right amount of money was poured in.

Well obesity is a problem but it needs guidance and support therapies to alter peoples way of lives and eating habits too.
Also some medications can be a major factor of weight gain.

However cancer is not selective, it claims, young old, overweight, normal weight, underweight, rich, poor, across the board.

So no, a cancer cure should not be underplayed in relation to obesity in my view.

...nothing is incurable...incurable is like saying impossible...it’s just finding the cure/treatment for each cancer and it should continue to be the focus it is...

Quite right. It's simplistic to suppose that everyone who is overweight is lazy and greedy. So many mental health issues can lead to comfort eating and other strange relationships with food and yet look at all the people here saying that all you need to do is eat less and move more. If only it was that simple. Maybe it makes some people feel better about their own fat bodies to laugh at others, I don't know... but obese people need just as much sympathy and support as the little waif-like anorexia sufferers. Obesity and anorexia are different ends of the same scale and yet no one says to anorexia sufferers, you just need to eat something, that's all.

Sadly, people will look as a super skinny anorexia sufferer and say, oh look she's tiny, like a little waif.... or something equally as inane. At the same time they'll look at someone who's obese and say, look at that fat, lazy cow.

The tax on a packet of cigarettes is well over 80%. 80%! If they can do that for cigarettes, why aren't they using the same strategy to tackle the other biggest health problem - obesity - by sticking 80% on unhealthy food?

I'd rather they focus on curing the disease than one of the symptoms tbh...

Well obesity can lead to about four types of cancer apparently so curing obesity will also help cut cancer rates.

It doesn't even need to be that high to be honest. Since the "high sugar tax" (I don't know if that exists in England yet?) sales of Coke Zero have soared and sales of OG Coca Cola have dropped right off. Its not even a huge pricing difference. "standard price" is £3.50 for 8 cans of coke zero, same price for 6 normal coke. £10 for a 24 pack of coke, £8 for Zero (often £7 at Tesco).

Yes I drink a lot of Coke Zero :worry:

That's right and some people are so desperate to lose weight and get conned with all this diet stuff promising miracles, you don't see skinny people being promised a miracle cure and conning people out of huge amounts of money, then you get food adverts all the time, take outs that you can order on tap, I think we as a nation are really unfair in the way we treat bigger people we could help in so many ways.

But yes, you can't "cure obesity" you have to tackle the underlying problem... Which is that people are miserable and food is the literal original pavlovian reward cycle buzz. Good luck combating that without combating a huge number of social problems :shrug:. Same as alcohol consumption. You can't fix it without addressing the reasons people do it... Stress, unhappiness, unfulfilling rat race lives.

Possibly worse with food, the people who DO have busy and full lives often don't have time to cook or plan their food consumption properly so end up with take-aways and snacks at the last minute which is far from ideal. Even very active people who won't necessarily end up overweight are still not getting proper nutrition.