When the radiologist who was doing her routine ultrasound announced to Charlotte, a happy fifty-something who loves life and good food, that she was suffering from “fatty liver disease”, she thought she was fainting. It must be said that this term is neither very appropriate nor very elegant. Some talk regarding soda disease, which does not fully account for this evil. It is the Anglo-Saxon name NASH (“non-alcoholic steato-hepatitis”) which is used in France and elsewhere, by the medical profession to designate this accumulation of fat in the liver, associated with inflammation, with the risk of develop fibrosis, the first step towards cirrhosis.
