Weight-loss drugs and surgery for kids leave parents with tough decisions

Unrecognised modern day child neglect and child abuse,

How did these children get so fat in the fist place? NEGLECT.

McLellan says doctors often push diets and drugs to achieve cosmetic fixes, not to solve actual medical problems. CHILD ABUSE!

In England and Wales there’s a risk of being prosecuted for reckless transmission of HIV if:

you had sex with someone who didn’t know you had HIV; you knew you had HIV at that time; you understood how HIV is transmitted; you had sex without a condom, and; you transmitted HIV to that person.

This law should also apply to those who abuse their child by feeding them too much.

prosecuted for reckless neglect of children by feeding too much.

you knew certain foods would make your child obese; You knew they would get fat: You understood that eating too much food led to obesity; you provided food without giving your child an alternative;

Retired psychotherapist and play therapist. Worked with my fare share of obese chiuldren

In my work, I’ve seen some incredibly obese children. And those incredibly obese children more often than not, turn into incredibly obese adults that have super super bad health outcomes. I think it’s actually advantageous to treat obesity in children as soon as it’s appropriate to. I’m less pro gastric sleeves etc for kids, because I’m also less pro for that in adults as it doesn’t always seem to help with the underlying behaviours (obsessive & compulsive eating). However, for some people it is the best and most appropriate treatment for their health conditions.

I can also however, understand the fear people may have around giving medication to kids for the purpose of weight loss. It is definitely something to be cautious about. However, sometimes the long-term impacts of the illness that needs treating trumps the possible long term negative side effects of the drugs. It’s really a balancing act. It’s never easy.

Yeah it'd be really great if these kids didn't become this obese in the first place, but the anecdote in the article is a very specific case:

> So Grace fought to get her middle-schooler on the new obesity drugs. Because no pediatric obesity specialists were available, she enlisted help from a medical researcher who diagnosed her daughter with a rare genetic disorder, PCSK1 deficiency, that causes rapid weight gain. (As it turns out, Grace was later diagnosed with this condition as well.)

In general it's probably best to do what helps kids feel comfortable earlier rather than later, especially if there is lower risk of dependency later in life.

This seems very much like a two-way door.