Here’s the science on obesity

By *Jomo Sanga Thomas

(“Plain Talk” April 17, 2025)

The growing waistline and bulging stomachs of an increasing number of Vincentians are a serious cause for concern. An increasing number of scientists are calling on health officials to label obesity as an incurable illness. A growing body of research shows that overeating may be more addictive than cocaine.   

A study in Britain revealed that of people who use crack cocaine, 10 to 20% become addicted to it. A study of obese people indicates that 98% of the men and 97.8% of the women failed to return to a healthy weight. Once extreme overeating begins, it appears to be almost impossible to stop.

There is little evidence that people who overeat become dependent on a single ingredient; instead, they seek out a range of highly palatable, energy-dense foods, such as those we are now surrounded by.

Consequently, there is a need for a public health rethink because research suggests people who believe they are overweight comfort-eat, leading to further weight gain. The activation of reward systems in the brain and the loss of impulse control are similar to those involved in dependency on drugs. But eating addiction appears to be more powerful. 

Once you become obese, your biological changes lock you into that condition. If you try to lose weight, the body perceives it is being starved, and powerful adaptations try to bounce you back to your previous state. Against incredible odds, people who manage to return to a normal weight must consume 300 fewer calories per day than those who have never been obese, if they are not to put the weight back on.

Once obesity is established, body weight seems to become biologically stamped in. The more weight you lose, the stronger the biological pressure to return to your former excessive size. The evidence points to high-fat, high-sugar foods that overwhelm the impulse control of children and young adults.

This statement will be unwelcome, but the science shows that obesity may be deemed an incurable disease. Therefore, fat-shaming is worse than useless. Researchers found that the more weight-conscious people are, the more likely they are to overeat: the stress it induces is a trigger for comfort eating. For the obese, temporary reductions in weight will almost inevitably be reversed.

People who are merely overweight, rather than obese, appear to suffer from the same biochemical adaptations. For them, changes in diet and exercise are likely to be effective. But urging obese people to buck up may produce nothing but misery.

The crucial task is to reach children before they succumb to this addiction. As well as help and advice for parents, this requires a significant change in what scientists call ‘the obesogenic environment’ (high-energy food and drinks and the advertising and packaging that reinforce their attraction). Unless children are steered away from overeating from the beginning, they are likely to be trapped for life.

Scientists say reversing the tide of obesity won’t be easy, but it can be done.  A different approach is needed. The key is to create health-promoting environments. This knowledge ought to lead to acceptance and empathy that end stigmatisation. Before understanding the science and consequences of overeating and obesity, I was very hard on overweight people.  I have not gone soft, but I am much more caring and understanding.

The available science points to the inability to treat obesity except through surgery.  The verdict is now in that dieting is more fad than proof as an effective tool for weight reduction. So, health officials may be ill-advised to propose a useless or punitive dietary regime for the obese person.

We must look deeper at the problem and answer a few basic yet important questions. Why do we have an obesity epidemic? Has the composition of the human species changed? Have we suffered a general collapse in willpower? No. The evidence points to high-fat, high-sugar foods that overwhelm the impulse control of children and young adults, packaged and promoted to create the impression that they are fun, cool, and life-enhancing.

This illness will continue to ravage the population and slowly overwhelm the health service until these circumstances change. Policy makers have a fundamental responsibility to make hard decisions regarding what our children and young adults are allowed to eat, particularly in public spaces. Have we stopped to consider the tremendous damage fast food joints and sugary drinks do to our health? Unless there are greater controls, we are on a road of no return to poor health, the consequences of which we have not yet fathomed.

We need to develop a new consciousness to inform people about the likely impact of what they eat. Most consumers are ignorant of the nutritional content of the foods they consume.

The food distributors will resist the obvious solutions until they can no longer be resisted. Eventually, the change will have to happen, with similar restrictions on advertising, sponsorship, display, and accessibility to those imposed on the tobacco peddlers. One day, though not before many thousands have needlessly died, it will become illegal to advertise any food or drink that is clearly harmful to people’s health. They will be sold only with health warnings, on high shelves out of the reach of children.

Does this seem draconian to you? If so, remember that obesity affects a growing percentage of the adult population. Diabetes and high blood pressure afflict even more. Everyone agrees that this situation is unacceptable?

Our choice is clear: to recognise that the only humane and effective means of addressing the obesity epidemic is to prevent more people from being hooked, by restricting the pushers of bad food. There’s an alternative: to continue a programme of fat-shaming and bullying whose only likely outcome is unhappiness.

This piece, with minor changes, first appeared in the Vincentian on September 16, 2015.

*Jomo Sanga Thomas is a lawyer, journalist, social commentator and a former Speaker of the House of Assembly in St. Vincent and the Grenadines.

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