Obesity Death Claim is Disputed

[Demi]

Although I've already added this to the original thread Obesity Kills Three-Year-Old Girl, but felt that it also warranted it's own thread.


Obesity death claim is disputed
BBC News - 9 June, 2004

A three-year-old girl whose death was used to highlight the problems of obesity died because she had a genetic defect, it has been claimed.
Last month a report by MPs on obesity prompted headline news when it included an account of the girl who weighed six stone when she died.

It sparked a debate about junk food, parental responsibility and exercise.

But scientists have told the BBC Radio 4's Today programme genetic abnormalities caused the girl's death.

Addenbrooke's Hospital at Cambridge University, which handled the case, said this meant she felt hungry all the time and her body was telling her she was starving.

'Choking on fat'

The condition could have been treated but doctors only found out after she died.

Her parents, who were blamed in some of the newspapers, are said to be extremely upset.

The Commons Health Committee used the evidence of Dr Sheila McKenzie, a consultant paediatrician at the Royal London, in its report.

She claimed a three-year-old died of heart failure, brought on by obesity.

And she warned children were choking because fat was blocking their airwaves.

Ms McKenzie was unable to comment when contacted by Today.

The report said obese children could become the first generation to die before their parents.





http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/3789357.stm

[CindySue48]

I'm not surprised. Reports I read had her at 6 stone, 8 stone, more than 8 stone, etc......just how much is a stone anyway????

Wonder if PCRM was behind it? Either way, I'm sure they'll be using the case to scare everyone! Hell, they'll say the parents were feeding her LC!

[Kristine]

>>"And she warned children were choking because fat was blocking their airwaves."

Even without the airwaves typo (her radio is clogged?), that's the most ridiculous wording I think I've ever heard for an effect of obesity. Choking on fat that's blocking one's airways? :rolleyes: They make it sound as though it could coat someone's lungs and trachea from the inside.

[Demi]

......just how much is a stone anyway????
A stone is 14lbs


Wonder if PCRM was behind it? Either way, I'm sure they'll be using the case to scare everyone! Hell, they'll say the parents were feeding her LC!
I don't think that the PCRM had anything to do with this - especially as I doubt very much that anyone in the UK would know who they were anyway.

It is, however, typical of the British media to take something out of context and whip up a frenzy around it :rolleyes:

[potatofree]

It doesn't really make the dabate less valid. I'm sure there ARE many cases where the cause of the obesity isn't 100% due to poor nutrition, I'm sure there are as many causes as individual cases. I've read of research into leptin/ghrelin <sp?> imbalances that lead to children binging constantly and never feeling full.

Obtructive sleep apnea IS basically being choked to death by your own fat, suffocated, whatever word you choose...air is cut off.

I watched a show with obese children, and one 9-month-old baby boy had to sleep propped up because he couldn't breathe laying down.

[Nancy LC]

There is a very rare genetic condition, don't remember the name, but basically it makes you eat because you constantly feel extremely hungry.

I remember a few years ago a case in the US where the mother was blamed for her child's death because of the same syndrome. Its horrible, but its definitely not the parents fault.

[ItsTheWooo]

Unsurprising. I had suspected all along the child probably had a genetic problem causing the obesity. When it comes to food intake, willpower & desire is a myth. Our minds can work with our bodies, but they can't work against it... at least not forever. Eventually the body wins (or it dies as is seen in anorexia). The endocrine system regulates weight and food intake over a long term period of time. Even if you are presented with a buffet and you desire to eat a lot of the food, and you do, a healthy normal-functioning body will compensate for the caloric excess by desiring less food in the coming days or weeks. If a body in a state of weight equilibrium is restricted food and loses weight as a consequence, your hunger will be higher in the next few days to compensate.
Only an unhealthy disease-stricken body will undernourish itself (with rare exceptions: example, coming off an insulin resistance & obesity-promoting diet). Likewise, only an unhealthy disease-stricken body will want to consume and consume and consume and never regulate energy intake with feelings of non-hunger & satiety (again with rare exceptions: example, children about to go through a growth spurt temporarily become "insulin resistant" so as to pack on pounds to provide fuel for it). Healthy bodies & minds maintain healthy weight effortlessly.

I am convinced physical or emotional disease are the only causes of obesity, the latter being the more rare manifestation. Sometimes (usually actually) obesity-promoting diseases overlap and compound the obesity problem. For example, someone who is prone to develop insulin resistance induced obesity might also have a mental binge eating disorder in which the person forces themselves to eat more than they want or more than their body physically desires. However, I maintain that no one is ever obese because they are 100% healthy. Nor can everyone become very obese, just like not everyone can become diabetic or get cancer. Genetic potential plays a crucial role. Obesity is an exclusive condition; you either have the genetic potential to develop diseases which cause it or you don't.

That's not to say we are powerless before our genetic potential though. We have a choice in the matter in so much that we can choose not to fulfill our high weight potentials. That means trying to educate ourselves about what causes our obesity, and once educated choosing to not continue to put ourselves in environments we know make us obese. In the cases of emotional disease induced obesity, it's a lot like anorexia. There is a choice to either continue using the same self destructive coping mechanisms or to try to develop new ones instead. Obesity for primarily emotional reasons is way harder to beat, IMO. It's a lot harder to change a coping mechanism developed probably in very early childhood than it is to simply cut out refined carbs.

However, because of the extreme nature of infant/toddler morbid obesity, I would say the overwhelming majority of such cases are caused by purely physical disease which is unresponsive to environmental variations. Obesity that extreme & that early in life implies the physical body has almost *no* ability to regulate food intake and weight, which of course implies a severe, extreme disease of the endocrine system.

[arc]

:confused:

[zedgirl]

There is a very rare genetic condition, don't remember the name, but basically it makes you eat because you constantly feel extremely hungry.

I remember a few years ago a case in the US where the mother was blamed for her child's death because of the same syndrome. Its horrible, but its definitely not the parents fault.

It's called Prader-Willi Syndrome.