Journal des pratiques avancées en soins infirmiers

Anti-Fat Attitude in Society and Healthcare: The Need to Reduce a Big Issue

Abstract

Kumar M and Saxena I

The number of overweight or obese persons is increasing in every country, and will probably not decline in the near future. Overweight obese persons have to face discriminatory attitude in the society as well as in healthcare centers, which affects their psychology as well as health. Many obese as well as normal weight people are unaware that this fat-shaming is wrong and should be stopped. Some healthcare providers believe that fat-shaming their obese patients will motivate them to lose weight. However, the mental anguish produced by such fat-shaming may compel such people to eat more, thus aggravating the problem. There is an urgent need to make the society and healthcare workers realize the ill-effects of the anti-fat bias so that such people may be treated with the empathy and respect that is the right of all human beings.