Disease Label for Obesity Benefits Drugmakers Most
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- The author draws a parallel to SSRIs, noting that when antidepressants reframed depression as a neurochemical disorder in the 1990s, it entrenched a pharmaceutical model and underemphasized social and economic contributors—and depression remains one of the leading causes of disability worldwide.
Why it matters: The classification of obesity as a disease determines which treatments receive research funding, insurance coverage, and clinical attention, and the AMA's own 2013 council warned that doing so could shift resources away from public-health interventions toward pharmacology—a shift that has now materialized as GLP-1 drugs generate billions in revenue.
