There is a lot in the news about fat people driving up the costs for healthcare. Never mind that most of it is based on estimates and predictions of the future; and never mind that at least a portion of those costs can be attributed to things like weight-loss attempts and health problems caused by those weight-loss attempts (I would love to have those numbers).
Then there are the problems caused because fat people are unwilling to go to the doctor because they don’t want to get the “diet talk”. So the fatty stays home, hopes for the best, and sometimes, ends up going to the doctor (or the ER) when the problem is much worse and it takes a lot more effort (and possibly expense) to deal with the condition.
Also fat people are underemployed and under paid. Makes it difficult to go to the doctor and/or pay for prescribed treatment. Which can mean that a condition gets worse or lingers longer than it would have otherwise.
Well, here’s a new one. Doctors are under-prescribing necessary medication to fat people. These medications are supposed to be prescribed based on weight, but some doctors are uncomfortable prescribing the drugs in larger doses. This has become a significant problem with chemotherapy.
http://jco.ascopubs.org/content/30/13/1553.abstract
Up to 40 percent of obese cancer patients don’t get large enough chemotherapy doses, jeopardizing treatment of individual patients — and the overall public health according to Dr. Jennifer Griggs, a University of Michigan breast cancer specialist. Under-dosing is probably a “significant” contributor to the higher cancer death rates among overweight and obese patients, according to co-author Gary Lyman, a professor of medicine at the Duke Cancer Institute.
The problem arises from doctors using outdated dosage caps from the initial trials for these drugs. Griggs and her co-authors have published new guidelines aimed at making sure even the heaviest cancer patients get the full treatment they need.
And it’s not just in cancer. Another study found that fat patients are often under dosed with antibiotics.
http://www.ajemjournal.com/article/S0735-6757%2811%2900244-0/abstract
So even if the fat patient can afford the treatment sometimes the doctor does not prescribe medication in size-appropriate dosage. So treatment lasts longer or fails.
And now my favorite.
The estimates for how much healthcare costs have increased because (wait for it) we have had the nerve not to die (as so often predicted). The audacity! Fat people are told over and over and over how deadly our fat is – and then we don’t die! We live to a ripe old age, when healthcare costs dramatically increase whatever the size of the patient.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/04/30/obesity-costs_n_1463764.html
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167629611001366
Maybe we should stop calling us morbidly (of, relating to, or caused by disease; pathological or diseased) obese to lively obese, or better yet, naturally fat human.
Fatties United! 
I have posts on these very issues in my draft folder! You are psychic!
I’m glad I’m not the only one bringing these drug dosing issues to the fore. Not every drug needs to be dosed differently for fat folk; it depends on how the drug works and how it’s cleared from the system. But some definitely do, and yet are chronically underdosed anyhow.
Frustrating.
Amen. And this has never been more powerfully affirmed for me than the past few days, when I have been shopping online for a rollator wheeled walker. I am only 62, but I have cerebral palsy & my balance issues are becoming much worse, so, because I do walk a lot & because the sidewalks in my town are pretty much a suicidal obstacles course even for able-bodied people, I have decided to get a walker. I am investigation various models, including reading reviews. I have found walkers designed to support people from 250 to 600 pounds. It it is amazing how many reviews I have read from people who are between 80 & 93 & also between 200 & 300 pounds. I don’t think they all landed here from another planet. There are plenty of old fat people around, more every day as the Baby Boomer generation ages.
I have also read many studies which indicate that fat people generally do BETTER, recover better, & survive longer, with cancer, heart disease, etc. Of course, it does help if they are given competent care & the right dosage of medication.