A GP has emailed Lockdown Sceptics with a short piece about obesity, which she calls the elephant in the room. Given its links to susceptibility to COVID-19, we have to start talking about it.
Forgive me if this offends you. For the past 16 months we have an elephant in the (COVID-19) room that we seem to refuse to talk about. As a clinician working in a very large London GP practice, I’ve been wondering if and when patients might spot the elephant and take some action. It hasn’t happened yet.
So what is the elephant you ask? It’s the undeniable fact that a healthy weight and lifestyle which includes regular exercise will (almost definitely) reduce your risk of dying with an infection such as Covid by an enormous amount. To name it and shame it, the elephant’s name is specifically obesity. Yes there are genetics, yes there is age, yes there are the random unlucky ones. But for the vast majority who become seriously ill with COVID-19, obesity is a significant contributory factor. The vast majority of patients who end up in ITU with Covid have a BMI of >25 and it often does’t end well for them.
Now you might think that’s not relevant to you as you have checked out the infection fatality risk in your age group (and hopefully the Covid ship has sailed anyway…) and you know it’s ridiculously low. However, is that really a good excuse? So you might get Covid and not die (I certainly hope you don’t), but what about the increased risks of developing diabetes, cancer, heart disease, strokes, infertility, difficult labours, long Covid (the list goes on and on)?
So, I’ve spent 16 months talking to my patients about this. (Contrary to public perception we have been doing something!) Have they listened? Well, yes, I would say most of them hear me out. However, what has struck me is that a few of them (a generally well educated, affluent bunch) were genuinely surprised by what they heard. They had no idea there was such a strong correlation between obesity and increased risk of dying or being very unwell with Covid. But sadly in the majority of cases I fear I’ve wasted my breath.
So, who’s to blame? SAGE wouldn’t deny it, Boris has mentioned it, the BBC have whispered about it… But the mystery remains as to WHY WE AREN’T SHOUTING ABOUT THIS FROM THE ROOFTOPS?!? Is it because the media and the rest of the band wagon are afraid of fat shaming? Or would a massive increase in health promotion distract from all the fear mongering and vaccine obsession? Boris has the perfect platform to mention this every time he does one of his irritating lectures to the nation.
I’m not writing this piece to rant. I’m writing it because maybe this is the forum to speak out and start to create a change that will not only reduce people’s risk of dying from diseases like Covid, but, more importantly, will reduce the risk of them getting innumerable diseases. Maybe what is needed is to separate statement of fact (obesity carries significant health risk) from subjective judgement (it’s your fault you’re obese). If we remove the subjective element, then perhaps we’d be able to talk about it in a more objective and calm way? It would allow us to state plainly the health risks, and (more importantly) facilitate weight loss for those who want to attempt it. It is very sensitive subject and until we stop worrying about causing offence we won’t be able to have a proper grown up discussion.
Update: Gary Johnson, the Managing Director of Inpharmation, has emailed us to correct the impression, given by the author of this piece, that obesity is a more important risk factor than age when it comes to susceptibility to COVID-19.
I know from reading your site regularly that you will be well aware that the risk of increasing age spans several order of magnitude. Whereas the risks from obesity are a fraction of an order of magnitude.
The best data I know of for the demographics and outcomes for patients on critical care is the INARC report on COVID-19 in critical care.
While it is true that around four fifths of the COVID critical care population have a BMI of over 25, this misleads. Firstly, the cut off for obesity is 30 and not 25. Secondly, as we age, we put on weight and the average age for critical care COVID patients is around 60. So we need to compare the critical care COVID population with the sex and age matched general population. You can see this on page 65 of the INARC report. The COVID critical care population is a just a little more overweight/obese than the general population. In earlier INARC reports, the proportions have actually been quite similar.
And, while it is true that it often does not end well for overweight COVID patients on ITU, it is no more true for them than for other COVID patients who end up on ITU. On page 65 of the report you will see that, surprisingly, a lower percentage of obese patients in critical care die (34.6%) than of non-obese patients. The worst outcome is for those patients with a BMI of <25, with 42.2% of those in critical care dying.
Please don’t get me wrong, I am not advocating obesity – just fact checking.
Keep up the great work.
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Token step in the Right direction, but ultimate proof of intent would be…
…Repeal of the 2008 Climate Claptrap Act and an ending of Green tyranny
…Disbanding of the Climate Claptrap Committee
…Abandonment of Green-energy incentives, subsidies and bungs
…Unit electricity prices comparable with American states not captured by Green tyranny
…Permanent disbarrings from public office for malfeasance and energy-treason
Icing on the cake, liberation from Green tyranny of cities like Oxford, Bristol and Brighton by genuinely Conservative councils.
…And obviously, exploitation of hydrocarbon and nuclear energy resources at the country’s disposal – the Green Lie that earth’s friend carbon dioxide is earth’s enemy needs ruthlessly rooting out.
All of that preceded by a clear statement that:
There is no catastrophic man-made climate change. The climate has always changed. If humans affect the climate somehow, and that is a big if, there is no evidence that it will be in any way catastrophic.
Net Zero for sure needs to be abandoned, but if we have to rely on Kemi Badenoch to do it we might be waiting a while. This woman gives me the impression she is still in the High School Debating Society. Trying to convince the Political Class that have all become UN/WEF lackeys pretending they are “saving the planet” needs a bit more than a polite sixth former in a blazer. ——-The only way this nonsense will be stopped is by the heavy uppercut of reality knocking it to the canvas. The fantasy land economics of Net Zero will vanish into ether because that is what all fantasies end up doing, and in the end we all have to live in the real world.
The Torytards won’t abandon Netzero. They will rename it as Ben Pile states to ‘clean energy’, or ‘Gaia neutral energy’ or some such nonsense.
The energy-climate con is about money laundering. That is its fetid heart. The gap toothed WEF acolyte Nigerian is, like her party, a liar. They will create their own ‘oven ready’ ‘clean energy’ plan. The variance with Net zero will be close to….zero.
You are not far wrong. They are all in on the phony planet saving eco scam. The public meanwhile are blissfully unaware that climate change isn’t and never was about the climate. It is a globalist spread the wealth Liberal Progressive Fraud.
“Money laundering” will suffice.
I’d say the enthusiasm for War is along the same lines. That and a way to control the masses because how long can they keep the Gaslighting going if they don’t.
the enthusiasm for War
This does seem to be stepping up a notch.
Three extracts from Badenoch’s speech:
‘Anyone who has done any serious analysis knows Net Zero cannot be achieved without a significant drop in our living standards, or worse, by bankrupting us.’
‘Even if we hit absolute zero we will not have Net Zero around the world if other countries are following us, and they are not.’
‘Net Zero makes us dangerously dependent on countries that don’t share our values and it is risking our own security.’
All true and not the words of someone who wants to continue with Net Zero. Surely it’s encouraging that at last a senior politician is prepared to say that?
Yes, it’s a start. All reasonable and civil points – but up against net-zero folly and climate fallacy that are unreasonable, uncivil and utterly unfounded in serious science.
I somehow doubt civil debate in a Westminster that near-unanimously waved through the 2008 Climate Change Act in an afternoon is going to unsettle very much at all.
Yeah but she said climate change exists. I hope she means that the climate changes and has always changed and will always change, regardless of human activity, but something tells me that by by “climate change” she means “man made climate change”.
My answer to the title of this piece is NO. She isn’t tough enough. She’s trying to change the direction of a supertanker by using a crisp packet on a string as a rudder. And that’s assuming that she knows the idea of “man made climate change” is nonsense.
She also didn’t address the false premise at the heart of the lunacy by stating that CO2 is not a pollutant and is in fact necessary for life on earth.
I’ve been fighting this battle for many years and I think her approach is wise. It’s possible to make an irrefutable case for abandoning net zero without going anywhere near the ghastly and highly emotional area of climate change science. Therefore, it’s best to do just that. Otherwise she’d be dismissed as a ‘denier’ giving her many opponents the perfect excuse for ignoring her views on the practicalities of the policy. And it’s those views that matter: the overriding priority is to get rid of this disastrous policy.
I disagree. In the US, yesterday’s “deniers” are today’s law makers.
What is “climate change science”?
(I agree that this disastrous policy needs to be got rid of.)
My point is simple: as it’s possible (easy even) to make an irrefutable case for abandoning this mad policy without the complication of any reference to ‘climate science’, that’s the way to go.
I do get your point. But I think the policy will have to be abandoned, sooner or later, regardless of what Kemi says or doesn’t say. And the tougher and more unambiguous the politicians’ statements are, the sooner the culture will shift.
And the culture needs to shift, if she is to have a hope of being elected.
But I think Kemi believes man-made climate change is 1. a thing and 2. a problem and 3. a problem which needs solving by her and her kind. She wants to run your life. THAT is a problem.
Otherwise, I believe she would not be the worst option right now for Prime Minister, but, well, they’re all the same…
You may ‘think’ that but her speech yesterday (read the transcript) contained no evidence supporting any of your three points.
She was being very careful, I’ll admit.
Time will tell!
Good luck to all.
I’m not sure what you mean by ‘careful’. But my view is that here at last we have a senior politician analysing in accurate detail some of the serious shortcomings of this disastrous policy. Yes, I wish she’d said more – especially by announcing that the Tories would scrap the policy entirely. But this is a good practical start and I very much welcome it.
She’s trying to change the direction of a supertanker by using a crisp packet on a string as a rudder.
Brilliant!
Nice one M A k.
👍
“Anyone who has done any serious analysis knows Net Zero cannot be achieved without a significant drop in our living standards, or worse, by bankrupting us.’”
That is not a categorical refutation.
Hmm … hard to row back on such a strong statement. Were she to revert to supporting Net Zero one day she’d rightly be accused of wishing for a significant drop in living standards and possible national bankruptcy.
Politicians are held to account?
And the only people who would remember what she said are people like us, i.e. the extreme minority, it seems…
That’s exactly what the people Pile refers to a Green Blob want and they’re not keeping this secret, see Climate and Nature Bill: Turn Britain into a green and pleasant wilderness with the population subsisting on rationed pulses in a universe of rationed anything, with rationed really meaning unavailable except to a privileged few.
“without a significant drop in our living standards”???——Is she having a laugh? She will be well aware that the whole point of Net Zero is to achieve a drop in living standards because the UN say our lifestyles are “Unsustainable”. In other words we have to much of everything and it has to be taken away. The way the UN and their phony climate policies do that is to take away the driver of prosperity which is FOSSIL FUELS.
Exactly.
But a “significant drop in our living standards” is the whole idea. The Political Class will NEVER tell you that as it would be Political Suicide. But Sustainable Development emanating from the UN is based on the idea that since there are now 8 billion people in the world, they cannot all have the same standard of living as the wealthy west, so we must reduce or even stop using the fossil fuels that gave us the standard of living we have because fossil fuels are a finite resource, and the west has used more than its fair share in becoming prosperous. The Miliband’s of this world are fully signed up to UN Agenda. But the shroud it all in talk of “energy security” “cheaper bills” “grasping the opportunity to be world leaders” etc etc.
She should have known all of that 6 years ago when another so called Conservative (Teresa May) gave us the Net Zero Amendment. This is just go with the flow from across the Atlantic political posturing because as usual the Political Class feel which way the wind is blowing and then try to pretend they were with that wind all along.
I’ve been campaigning against mad climate policies for about 15 years and this is literally the first time a senior politician has made a statement with which I agree. Yes of course I would have liked her to have gone further – but nonetheless I find this encouraging and very welcome.
The Conservatives have, over the years, maintained their existence by major policy pivots (e.g. the repeal of the Corn Laws).
Badenoch’s speech is only a hint of a policy pivot, perhaps trying to keep the Green Wets on side. It’s not enough. To be fair had she talked about actual repeal of the Climate Change Act or ending the Climate Change Committee she would probably lose her position as Leader.
A plan should have a strategy
A strategy should be broad and simple
Here’s one:
Strong government.
A strong government would return Britain to the laws, regulations and taxes of 1990.
That would require the repeal of ten thousand laws.
That would be strong government.
Impossible? Take a look stateside……
The impending bankruptcy of Greenpeace might wake up a few more people….every little step….
I didn’t realise that was happening. More good news.
Hear, hear.
Ooh goody.😀😀😀
Grown too big for their boots have they / too much overhead and bureaucracy?
Take it back to basics. It can either be cheap energy or expensive energy. Thrive or just survive. Not that difficult surely?
But lest we forget, way beyond the wit of Mrs Maybee’s government that in 2019 buried the country up to its neck in folly.
If Badenough really tries to take on the Net Zero lunatics who infest (and fund) her own Party, they’ll get rid of her before she can say “frack.”
The only way the SCAM will be stopped is for a Government made up of MPs from OUTSIDE the Establishment. The only reasonably realistic prospect of that happening is Farage and Reform.
If you vote for anyone else, you’re endorsing the SCAM.
Farage is a fraud.
Sorry hux but Farage is our last hope,fraud or not!
A piss poor one then. According to Farage everyone is a racist and the Koranimal cult is off limits to criticism.
Nope.
One could also call him a self-employed PR clown. But this doesn’t change the situation. He’s the so-far most successful political figure outside of the unipartyverse. This means for the moment, it has to be Farage.
To a degree, all ‘our’ politicians are frauds because they sort-of grow naturally in the political system we happen to have. But that’s a problem for another time. The Nut Zero deadlines are getting preciously close meanwhile and if we don’t want rationed pulses to save the planet, we’ll need to get rid of that first.
To be fair he has always been against the eco scam though and says why it is a fraud. It is only now that the Political hand wringers in the uni party are starting to fumble about looking for excuses to kick it into the long grass, or at least to the edge of the fairway into the light rough. ——-People can say what they like about Trump, Farage, Musk etc, but I would rather vote for them than the parasites
Farage will disappoint. Massively.
Kurten isn’t. But there is zero chance of him getting anywhere close to the levers of power.
Sadly you are right Hux. And a bumtious narcissist to boot.
Theresa May wrote on X: “Net zero by 2050 is challenging but achievable.” “It is supported by the scientific community and backed by the independent Climate Change Committee as being not just necessary but feasible and cost-effective,”
Utter BS.
And Badenoch is on a hiding to nothing.
How does May know it is achievable? There was no debate, no discussion of cost/benefit and not even a vote. It was simply waved through Parliament because the Political Class were falling inline with the wishes of their globalist bosses at the UN/WEF
How does May know it is achievable?
Because that’s in the script she’s reading from.
Can the Tories firk right off?
First person I turn to on all decisions involving Britain is a Nigerian anchor baby!
I have no doubt that she likes the country and wishes it well, but ‘our ancestors’ was laying it on a bit thick.
Agreed,
‘our ancesters’ indeed
Great, now do Deportations and Covid.
It’s a sad state of affairs when even Reform are well to the left of where we need to be, but nevertheless it is useful that such a public figure is voicing this.
Its Trump we have to thank. He’s made it OK for pols to talk about:
Ending the trans shit
Curtailing illegal immigration
Cutting quangoes (even 2tk seems to get this bit)
Ending the insane demonisation of CO2
TTK won’t be cutting any public sector jobs. His mission is to bankrupt the country.
Trust the Nigerian to deliver? NO! Interesting that today GB News is talking about an admission from government that Net Zero will shrink the economy by 10% by the end of the decade. They don’t go on the mention that by 2050 the remaining 90% will be gone.
I don’t believe anything she or the rest of the Tory claque say.
She’s just “suddenly” realised the impossibility of Net Zero – how did she not notice years ago?
Are we to believe that if the Tories had won the last election Kemi, whether or not as leader would be “abandoning” Net Zero? Go on. Pull the other one it’s got bells on.
Better to call her by her real name: Olukemi Olufunto.
How did she not notice years ago? – because she wasn’t looking, and their was no possibilities of votes/power through talking about it, exactly the opposite in fact…
It seems to me that Dinger and FerdIII are the only ones who really get it.
Everyone else is just wasting time and energy seriously debating the Fake Promises of the Globalist Manchurian Candidate, assisted by the commenter called Robin Guenier who suddenly pops up whenever the Nigerian Anchor Baby needs supporting.
If anyone calls you a “wacist” for resisting the Globalist Chosen One, particularly one Jewish commenter who lives in Holland and works in Belgium, just ask them this:
“When is Netanyahu stepping down to put an Ethnic African woman in his place as Leader of the Israeli People?”
“Where are all the Ethnic Africans, Ethnic Indian Subcontinentals, Catholics and Muslims in top positions in the Israeli Government, legislature, judicial system and every other aspect of Israeli society?”
“Why is all this Diversity, Equality & Inclusion being forced upon Britain and every country of the West, but not on Israel or anywhere in the Third World?”
You really are a nasty piece of work.
No, I am not. I am HONEST, and asking THREE HONEST QUESTIONS about why:
1) Some countries in the world are allowed to INSIST on their right to an ETHNO-STATE, such as Japan, India, China and Israel.
2) Some countries INSIST on their right to a RELIGIOUS STATE, such as Pakistan & Saudi Arabia.
3) And ONE of those countries, ISRAEL, insists on their right to both an ETHNO-STATE and a RELIGIOUS STATE, while simultaneously DENYING the right of ALL WESTERN COUNTRIES to have their own ETHNO-STATES.
Answer the questions, instead of just pointlessly gnashing your teeth.
In 2023, the Israeli Arab population stood at 2.1 million people, accounting for 21% of Israel’s total population, and there are twenty nine mosques. There are 185,000 Christians free to worship in churches. I could go on, but are there any reliable figures on how many Jews and Christians are in Iran after the 1979 Islamic Revolution? Or, Saudi Arabia? Or any other Islamic country? In Israel there is religious freedom and no persecution.
BPile has one of the most complete understandings and scope of the green blob problems. This organization has been building for over 50 years by zealots and extremists with ever increasing amounts of money which is now largely coming from Western governments treasuries. Group think dominates as any opposition or thought is censored. It is now a cult like movement demanding belief and faith. Clearly, Badenoch has no idea of what she is up against. This will not be fixed with reasoning.
No, she’ll be conveniently removed
“But is Badenoch really willing to reveal what’s beneath the fig leaf of unscientific scaremongering about the ‘climate emergency’? We can but hope”
Yeah right and I’m a Dutchman!