What We Don't Talk About When We Talk About Fat

by Aubrey Gordon

REALIZE THE PROMISE OF HEALTHCARE FOR FAT PEOPLE Fat people deserve responsive, competent healthcare and access to the same diagnostic tests and treatments that thin people get. As it stands, hospitals are not required to have equipment on hand that accommodates fatter people, from exam tables to MRI machines. Doctors are free to set weight limits on the patients they’re willing to see, and some do. The FDA doesn’t require testing of drugs on fatter people, which means that crucial drugs like emergency contraception have significantly reduced effectiveness on people who weigh more than 165 pounds.2 Transgender people faced weight-based barriers to accessing lifesaving medical care, including gender affirming surgeries. We can end these unnecessary restrictions and barriers by passing a fat patients’ bill of rights. We can require that healthcare providers undergo weight bias training as part of their existing schooling and continuing education requirements, and insert into training curriculums more information about the social determinants of health and the toll that discrimination and shaming can take on any marginalized patient—including fat patients. We can insist that the medical field catch up to its own research and acknowledge that fatness isn’t a failure of personal responsibility but the result of a complex set of factors that may include our environments, our genes, our existing physical and mental health diagnoses, and the shame and marginalization we experience...