Ben Gilbert: evaluation

Transcript context

…Yeah. This was truly an out-there idea. There is a huge, huge stigma around weight loss drugs, enormous. Yes, the stigma is real, but there's also an interesting product efficacy thing here. Vox.com put it really well. They said, not only do weight loss medications have a dangerous history, but there is also a persistent bias and stigma against the disease that now afflicts nearly half of Americans. Obesity is still widely viewed as a personal responsibility problem, despite scientific evidence to the contrary. History has shown that the most effective medical interventions such as bariatric surgery, which is stomach stapling, effectively the gold standard in treating obesity, often go unused in favor of diet and exercise, which for many don't work. This is proven over and over and over and over again. You can't just tell people, change your lifestyle. Most people literally can't. There are too many things working against it, including their own biology. Additionally, this is pretty interesting, researchers thought it was actually impossible to create a weight loss drug that was both safe and effective. Are you talking about Fen-Phen?…

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