The numbers about how much fat ppl "cost" society are made up. The very idea that ppl can "cost" too much = morally corrupt & wrong. Fat is ok
Every single person alive is priceless, b/c that person is a unique individual.
RESEARCH. HAVE YOU TRIED IT? The numbers aren’t made up. Those are factual, governmental numbers calculated by people who know what they’re doing.
“March 2004- The CDC releases its report during a highly publicized news conference saying obesity kills 400,000 Americans a year and is poised to become America’s number one preventable death, resulting in alarming front page headlines across the nation.
May 2004, Science magazine reports on the 400,000 deaths figure: “Some researchers, including a few at the CDC, dismiss this prediction, saying the underlying data are weak. They argue that the paper’s compatibility with a new anti-obesity theme in government public health pronouncements – rather than sound analysis – propelled it into print.”
November 2004- The Wall Street Journal publishes a front-page story on errors in the 400,000-deaths study. The paper notes the study “inflated the impact of obesity on the annual death toll by tens of thousands due to statistical errors … Dr. Pechacek wrote to colleagues that he had warned two of the paper’s authors, as well as another senior scientist, ‘I would never clear this paper if I had been given the opportunity to provide a formal review.’
January 2005- The CDC admits that its 400,000 deaths figure was exaggerated due to mathematical errors.”
From the Wall Street Journal article–
“Dr. Gerberding, in an interview yesterday, acknowledged that there had been human errors in the study’s calculations, but said they don’t diminish the threat that obesity causes to public health. “The bottom line is that obesity is a leading cause of death,” Dr. Gerberding said. “This paper in and of itself is a very minor contributor to our knowledge of obesity.“
(And they know this because how? The numbers they made up?)
“Still, the revision is sure to further confuse an already roiling national debate over how serious an impact obesity is having on the public’s health. Since its release, the study has been cited repeatedly by officials including Secretary of Health and Human Services Tommy Thompson, members of Congress and makers of weight-loss drugs seeking to draw attention and funding to anti-obesity efforts.”
Additionally– The CDC changed it’s BMI standards on who is “overweight” or “obese” in 1998, which according to CNN made “25 million Americans” too fat overnight.
So if you wanted to compared rates of fat people prior to 1998 and after, there’s no way to do a clean comparison. It’s not apples to apples.
There are not good statistics to make comparisons to prior to a certain point, and the stats are all jacked up by this change, so the data is meaningless.
Don’t come for me screaming about research when you don’t know the first thing about what you are talking about, @wordalchemist200.
I’ve been researching this topic since 2008.
The news that the numbers were off may have been Front Page News (or, at least, Page 2 news) for a week or two. But the actual, 2005, retraction of the ‘400k Obesity Deaths Per Year Report’ BY the CDC was back-paged by EVERY MAJOR MEDIA OUTLET INCLUDING THE CDC ITSELF. Their admission of incorrect and TOTALLY overblown numbers was posted in a small blurb on their website that had to be dug out of multiple nested links and occupied one corner of a page. As far as the News Media? Confirmation that the numbers are WRONG, and details on how badly off they are, was back paged in weekly ‘Science Editions’ (if the Pubs had one). Or tucked in, under the fold, and after the Obituaries. Results?
TO THIS DAY, we STILL get Official Health News outlets & Medical Publications who will quote this ERRONEOUS DATA as if it was solid research.
This: One of the main talking-points and DRIVERS of ‘Obesity Epidemic’ panic mongering, Is completely & utterly incorrect.
Casual reminder that fat people don’t cost taxpayers too much money and that we deserve love and respect like everyone else. -Mod V
