Freedom of expression

I was in the waiting room of my maxillo-facial doctor to treat a TMJ problem, when a brochure praising the effect of BOTOX cosmetic treatment for people between 18 and 65 years has caught my attention. The motto used was ‘’BOTOX – The Freedom of Expression’’.

I felt uncomfortable and sad to see how this recent finding has been turned into a lucrative business exploiting personal uneasiness ,and above to see that there are so many people paying thousands dollars per year to receive this treatment.

I think this is symptomatic to the society we are living in where you have to perform well, to have the right look, without any sign of weakness…

To me frowns and wrinkles are richness like our memory. They are the expression of our life, who we are, the bad and good things we have had in our life. They are the final stage of expression of things we have perhaps not expressed with words, like resentment, anger, love….

I agree that this treatment is a great help for people who have had a cancer for example and for which the therapy has let strong marks difficult to accept. In that case, it can be a real help and should be proposed.

But how explain BOTOX treatment for young people of 18 years old?

What are they looking for? Do they need to look perfect to be loved?

I really think that we should start again from the beginning and learn to express our emotions, be more peaceful with others and ourselves and accept us as we are.

Appearance is just an envelope. What counts is inside.

Is obesity a fatality?

I read an interesting article in NewsWeek –September 21st – about recent findings that will certainly change our perception on the increasing problem of obesity.

While it is widely known that about 60% of Americans are overweight or obese, recent studies from Scientist of Harvard School of Public Health pointed out a new tendency observed in infants under 6 months. Obesity in this segment of the population has risen by 73% since 1980. It is clear that conventional explanations like bad eaten practices and inactivity cannot be applied to babies!!

Indeed, it has been found that pollutants in the food chain could modify some genes that will generate more fat cells which stay for life and altering metabolic rate which results in the accumulation of calories rather than burning them.

This article has had a great impact on me and I took time to think about it.

First I think we have to remain very tolerant with people concerned by obesity. There are various reasons that can lead to obesity. Most of them are said to be due to personal choices but some are not under personal control, like hormonal disease or consequence of heavy medications. The new findings explored in the article show that nobody is sheltered from being concerned by this epidemic phenomenon far beyond individual control.

Overweight people are often marginalized and caricaturized. Marginalized because they are different, because they require more medical support to treat diabete, heart disease related to the obesity increasing health-care costs at a time politics try to reduce health care bill. Caricaturized as indolent people responsible of their condition as a result of personal choices. I think we should be more open-minded and try to see how much they probably suffer from their condition.

Then I was a little bit frightened by the article as it demonstrates once again how we can be exposed to risks without any knowledge of the consequences on our health and on the health of future generations.

I hope that NIH and FDA’s scientists’ determination will be strong enough to alarm politics and that appropriate decisions will be made to protect us and future generations.