@agingroy You are completely correct. For two decades the largest science con I'm aware of, has brainwashed an entire generation of scientists working in exercise, metabolism & health. The originators of the defective & oft fabricated data, remain front & centre
https://t.co/MlWxfvK6yE
This is a sharp critique that computational biologists must heed. Integrating 11k+ heterogeneous datasets requires aggressive batch correction, which can inflate predictive metrics. Plus, translating controlled rodent signatures to highly variable human tissues has clear limitations.
@changmyung1981 Yet under in vivo testing, diminishing the rate of PCr depletion, dramatically reduces lactate production, protects ATP levels & is accompanied by greater acetyl group oxidation - all while doing greater work. No need for a complex role for lactate
https://t.co/TAyRX1IAx6
@nicolelampert There's a section of @CelticFC supporters, my team, that are sub-human terrorist supporters. The fact they can't see the ~equivalence between the history of the occupation of Ireland with repeat occupation and attacks on the home of the Jewish people baffles me.
🚨 Should obesity always be considered a disease?
A provocative new Nature Comment argues that the answer is no.
Francesco Rubino, chair of the 2025 Lancet Commission on Clinical Obesity, challenges the growing movement to classify all obesity as a chronic disease. Instead, he proposes a more nuanced framework distinguishing clinical obesity from preclinical obesity, with major implications for diagnosis, treatment, health policy, and research.
The central argument
For years, obesity was viewed primarily as a risk factor for diabetes, cardiovascular disease, cancer, and premature mortality.
More recently, advocacy groups and professional societies have increasingly promoted obesity as a chronic disease to reduce stigma and improve access to treatment.
However, Rubino argues that this shift may oversimplify a highly heterogeneous condition.
Two individuals with exactly the same BMI can have dramatically different health states:
✅ One may have preserved organ function and remain healthy for decades.
❌ Another may experience heart failure, respiratory impairment, metabolic dysfunction, and severe mobility limitations.
Yet current classifications often place both under a single disease label.
Clinical vs Preclinical Obesity
The 2025 Lancet Commission proposed a distinction:
🔴 Clinical obesity
Excess adiposity directly causes organ dysfunction
Impairs daily activities
Produces measurable physiological abnormalities
Represents a true disease state
🟡 Preclinical obesity
Excess adiposity is present
Organ function remains preserved
Future risk is elevated
Disease has not yet developed
This framework treats risk as risk and disease as disease.
Why BMI alone is insufficient
The article emphasizes that obesity differs from diseases such as diabetes or COVID-19.
Classic diseases are usually defined through:
Consistent symptoms
Predictable clinical trajectories
Shared biological mechanisms
Obesity lacks this uniformity.
BMI predicts population-level risk but often fails to predict:
Individual prognosis
Current health status
Treatment response
Underlying biology
As a result, obesity cannot always be interpreted as a disease at the individual level.
The biological argument
Another key point:
There is no single biological abnormality shared by all people with obesity.
While genetics, environment, aging, sleep disruption, medications, and food environments contribute, obesity represents multiple biological pathways rather than one disease mechanism.
The success of GLP-1 receptor agonists demonstrates that body weight is biologically modifiable—but not necessarily that every case of obesity constitutes disease.
Policy implications
The consequences are enormous.
If every person with obesity were classified as having a chronic disease:
Hundreds of millions could become eligible for lifelong treatment
Health systems could face unsustainable costs
Access criteria might become increasingly arbitrary
Some individuals may receive therapies with limited clinical benefit relative to risk
The author argues that treatment intensity should be proportional to demonstrated disease burden rather than BMI alone.
Take-home message
The debate is not whether obesity can be a disease.
The debate is whether all obesity should be considered disease.
Rubino argues that diagnostic precision matters:
Clinical obesity = disease.
Preclinical obesity = elevated risk, but not disease.
Recognizing this distinction could improve patient-centered care, sharpen research, reduce overtreatment, and create more sustainable health policy.
Reference
Rubino F. Why obesity shouldn’t always be considered a disease. Nature. 2026;654:33–36.
#Obesity #GLP1 #MetabolicHealth #Endocrinology #PublicHealth #PrecisionMedicine #ObesityMedicine #NatureJournal #Metabolism #HealthcarePolicy
Every word of this.
Brendan O’Neill nails it yet again. 🎯🎯🎯
“Defamations against Israel fall from the mouth of every influencer here. Even a sports presenter, following the game with Qatar, could casually say on air that Israel is waging a ‘genocidal campaign’ in Gaza. Nothing to say about Qatar? The team we just played? Which funded the army of anti-Semites that killed more Jews in one day than anyone else has since the Nazis? Of course not. Israel is the all-consuming devil that stalks the fever dreams of Ireland’s pious. It is a substitute Satan in a post-Catholic land. You can’t even watch the footie here without being subjected to self-righteous homilies about the uniquely wicked nature of this far-off nation. It is relentless. It is exhausting.”
Finally public! Dr @CharlesMBrenner joins University of Helsinki, SWAN network in Faculty of Medicine, also connected to @HiLIFE_helsinki and Faculty of Pharmacy.
Warm welcome to Charlie, a leading figure in the field of redox metabolism.
https://t.co/VWu1a2H3tY
NHS doctor Ranjeet Brar claims he's not antisemitic and that the NHS has got it wrong in giving him a warning not to engage in further antisemitic discourse.
Brar has been arrested 3 times but says he's not antisemitic just anti Israel. Let's take a look and see...🧵
Hey @WMPolice@AVFCOfficial are in the @ChampionsLeague.
Lots of big nights ahead at Villa Park!
So If Villa draw PSG - after 900 arrests and 178 security personnel injured in France - will PSG fans be banned?
Or is it okay because they are not Jews?
Asking for a friend.
@agingroy Genetics of fitness is clear. Yet we've never nailed down the variants that drive. We've made some progress on fitness adaptability. Amazing given the potential importance.