How is obesity a disease

Abstract

The American Medical Association has announced this week that it now recognises obesity as a disease1. In coming to this decision it concluded that ‘recognizing obesity as a disease will help change the way the medical community tackles this complex issue that affects approximately one in three Americans’. Arguments against the classification of obesity as a disease have been made on the grounds that obesity is more a risk factor for other conditions than a disease in its own right and that ‘medicalizing’ obesity by declaring it a disease would define one-third of Americans as being ill and could lead to more reliance on costly drugs and surgery rather than lifestyle changes.