Labour should invest in weight loss medications immediately

Isn't sustaining the weight loss over time a very different matter?

And if we aren't changing the obeseogenic conditions that have created such widespread overweight and obesity then there's little to support the maintenance of that weight loss.

This is a map showing how complex the contributions to obesity are (with explanations). (There are more complex system maps.)

https://foresightprojects.blog.gov.uk/2017/10/04/dusting-off-foresights-obesity-report/

King's Fund has a useful overview: https://www.kingsfund.org.uk/insight-and-analysis/reports/tackling-obesity-nhs

Do you have a link to show it's a myth? I can only find information saying fat is an issue. Will low fat upfs make you sick too?

Obesity would be better controlled with a ban on margarine and vegetable oil, and a huge tax on sweets, puddings and cakes, and the money go to the NHS, Also, big tax on UPF.

SO, increase taxes to pay for weight loss medication for people who are overweight for mental/social reasons? Oh, just medicate people? They may not be able to afford to eat healthily, you know that, right? They may be eating for depression, stress....paying for medication when not treating mental health/social reasons won/t work! They will still buy the cheap shit because.....that's the most filling foods they can buy on what little money they have.

In this country (my home country's obeisty rate is about 4% of the population, as opposed to Britain's 25% obese/almost 40% overweight), when you a) have little money, you need to feed yourself/your family and a pizza costs the same as a broccolli head so what will keep you feeling full more, it's very easy to judge when you have mouths to feed but the shit food is cheap but more plentiful. In my home country, where a more unintentionally veggie diet is cheap, varied, and extremely healthy, even if you are poor it's very easy to eat cheap but healthily. Also, it;s not about "doing more exercise" - it's literally diet. Literally.

No. The purpose of the NHS is to treat disease. It's up to individuals to eat well and proportionately, rather than expecting to be given a pill for it.

I recently had to pay £2500 for a course of medication for two years to ensure I was optimally treated for osteoporosis because NICE has too high a bar.

If people want to lose weight they should eat less. If they can afford to eat too much food, they can afford to pay fkr weight loss drugs if that is what they want. Want being the operative word.

I'm absolutely not prepared tonaccept my taxes shoukd be spent in this way when the NHS has refused to provide me with the clinical treatment I need for a chronic disease.

No. It's like I am legend as it is.

Looking forward to a load of women who look dried out waiting for gallbladder surgery. These meds were for a specific group of people who can't ruddy get a hold of it. It's not on.

No. I think health messages should underpin every aspect of our society and the government should invest in facilitating that. We should be taught about and encouraged towards looking after our bodies with good nutrition and excercise from cradle to grave. Parent and baby groups with this advice on tap, healthy school meals, green spaces and incentives to use them such as free sports facilities, bike hire, use of swimming pools, free gym memberships, employers to offer excercise breaks...There is no point sticking a plaster on it with a quick fix, a quick fix that targets only one unhealthy group at that, what about all the thin people who never eat a vegetable from one year to the next? The whole culture around health needs to change and that needs a long term holistic approach.

Or how about people take responsibility for themselves instead of expecting someone else to do it for them?

Couldn’t agree more with this. Food in schools, hospitals etc is absolutely dire. UPFs are everywhere. Education and a change in the food industry is what is needed.

The food lobby is massively powerful. They pump out cheap crap by the hundred tonnes and resist all regulation to insist on quality. Profits first and last and never mind the health of the nation. Good food is not cheap, nor should it be. It should be subsidised so it's cheaper to eat well and healthily instead of propping up shareholder dividends.

People know what they need to do to loose weight, so to some extent they should be responsible for their own actions. It used to the case that if you smoked or were overweight you had to address that before expecting surgery on the NHS. Maybe it should the case for other issues, as a fair amount of health problems will be helped/reduced by losing weight.

surely better to tax all high sugar foods, ban foods companies from marketing them at all like they have done cigarettes (plain packaging that not shows adverse side effects), in particular any marketing directed towards children

They’d be much better off investing in treating the psychological causes of obesity. I say this as someone who is obese.

That's right. Let's start putting fat people in the stocks and throw things at them. Make them realise how disgusting they are.

Or maybe we could recognise that obesity is a disease and treat people with respect. Just an idea.

Type 2 diabetes can be controlled by weight loss. These drugs are very useful for that.

a predisposition for type 2 diabetes can be genetic but it’s not a genetic condition.

This is a really good point but I also think that they could do both this and weight loss drugs

Excellent, I'm all in favor of anything that helps people to improve their health. It is an uphill struggle, you have to swim against the tide, temptation is everywhere, the lure of highly palatable edible food like substances can be overwhelming!

aren't some of these drugs now being shown to cause irreversible sight loss? I don't think enough is known about their long term effects to put the entire nation on them

No one is mandating anyone do anything. Simply we are asking for the one of the few actually effective treatments for the no.1 health condition in the uk to actually be available on the NHS.