Obesity a Disease

On June 19, NBC's TODAY, reported on the American Medical Association's decision to classify obesity as a disease:

"The American Medical Association officially designated obesity as a disease – a disease that requires medical treatment and prevention.

The organization doesn’t have any kind of official say in the matter, but it’s influential nonetheless, and the vote of the AMA’s policy-making House of Delegates is one more step in the evolution of social attitudes towards obesity.

'Recognizing obesity as a disease will help change the way the medical community tackles this complex issue that affects approximately one in three Americans,' AMA board member Dr. Patrice Harris said in a statement ...

Obesity is more than just a matter of carrying around too much fat, says Dr. Michael Joyner, an exercise physiologist at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. 'The fat cells themselves we thought of for a long time as just warehouses for energy,' Joyner said in a telephone interview. But they also secrete chemicals, including chemicals that can cause inflammation, raise blood pressure and that down the road help harden the arteries."

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