Whether it stems from bad stress or “eustress,” expectation anxiety does have an antidote, which is acceptance.

We are allowed to set limits. We don’t need to announce them in a cruel or intolerant way, but we can set them. How?

We simply do not want any more people to get COVID-19, especially kids and their parents, and the medical personnel we count on to help us survive.

A new COVID variant has shown up in South Africa, and as it soon might be found around the globe, we must take care of our healthcare professionals.

People celebrate by eating and drinking to excess, but we’re not judging. Here’s a partial list of our holiday posts on how to stay healthy during the holidays.

Children with obesity or another pre-existing condition are particularly apt to contract COVID-19, and more likely to experience a serious case.

Obesity and coronavirus are mutually beneficial. They create and select victims for each other.

Because COVID-19 seems to have a special affinity for fat cells, a lot of children who catch the disease are overweight or obese already.

COVID-19 disproportionately targets Latino and other ethnic communities, and adding obesity to the equation is a recipe for disaster.

McDonald’s was identified as one of the top five companies whose advertising targeted the young, and who were specifically blamed for childhood obesity.

So here ya go, kids — eat this, drink that, and be sure to spend plenty of time sitting around engaging with social media — the obesity trifecta!

The drawing power of the Happy Meal depends mainly on the appeal of novelty for the child, and nostalgia and emotional blackmail for the parent.

A study of parents’ fast-food restaurant purchases finds that 74 percent of kids still receive unhealthy drinks and sides with their kids’ meals.

McDonald’s has been willing to tweak and tinker with the Happy Meal, but the parents and health professionals who hate it are unlikely to ever be reconciled.

This is a McDonald’s-related trip down Memory Lane to stop at a few memorable landmarks and catch up on some items not previously mentioned here.

It has been a while since we caught up with McDonald’s, often blamed as the instigator of much childhood obesity. The company has been up to some new tricks.

Childhood obesity was already a noteworthy trend, but the pandemic has caused this trend to soar to new levels. What can and should be done?

Whether the trend of rejecting such descriptors as curvy, full-figured, plus-size, zaftig, etc. is healthy or counterproductive has been much discussed.

Unapologetically obese people have some strong voices, and their point of view is sought by publications for reviews of entertainment based on obese characters.

In entertainment media, obesity is sometimes just a sub-theme, or comes with fat jokes and food jokes. Rarely it is about full-fledged human beings and respect.

Take a look at two movies that deal with trauma, fat-shaming, self-acceptance, and a wonderful celebration of big women.

Aside from the effect on appetite, there is the all-important question of how body weight is affected by both sucrose and the non-nutritive sweetener.

Currently, so many stresses work together to create a fraught environment for children, including factors that contribute to creating an obesogenic environment.

Halloween doesn’t need to be an orgy of high-fructose corn syrup. Here are some creative ways to keep it healthy.

Mothers and children are not only at risk of death or serious disability. Childhood obesity is woven right into the fabric of the coronavirus pandemic.

After years of hearing about how fat people are ruining it for everybody, the epidemic has provided new ways to make overweight and obese people feel bad.

Not only overweight and obese people are dealing with the ugly possibility of falling ill with coronavirus but they also have to deal with the weight stigma.

At this moment in history, we must realize that children are not magically immune to COVID-19 and that both obesity and COVID are equal-opportunity predators.

It did not take long for the unholy alliance between Obie and Covie to become apparent. And there is no end in sight, at least for the obesity epidemic.

Many of the measures society takes to protect children from the virus can paradoxically end up worsening the problem by causing even more obesity.