Food Industry Poised to Control Britain’s Anti-Obesity Policy
The Onion is known as one of the hottest works of satirical art on the planet throughout history. Bearing that in mind, have you ever had the experience of seeing a news story that you figured has to be from The Onion? And then you found out that it’s from a regular newspaper. Don’t you […]
The Childhood Obesity Perfect Storm, Part 3
We have talked about the Perfect Storm concept before. This is what happens when a whole lot of conditions converge to cause a large problem. Probably no single one of them alone would have done it. But when they gang up and come at us all at once, we’re toast. The childhood obesity epidemic seems […]
Sarah Palin Not Worried About Childhood Obesity
Sarah Palin just can’t seem to stay out of the news. Now she has everybody riled up over cookies. But what’s a tea party without cookies? The state of Pennsylvania has some new guidelines in the pipeline aimed at reducing the childhood obesity rate. We learn from an ABC News story attributed to three writers […]
Zoe Harcombe, or How to Not Be Big, Fat, and Stupid
Childhood obesity is just adult obesity getting an early start, and we had better get this thing figured out before 100% of us are overweight or obese. To encourage us, Justin Stoneman recently published an essay in The Huffington Post titled “America: A Big, Fat, Stupid Nation.” First of all, Stoneman is astonished that, with […]
The Food Addiction Paradigm and Resistance
“My ‘AHA’ Moment” is a short and to-the-point message written by an overweight blogger named Rebecca, who says, I finally realized that even if others can eat junk foods, foods high in the (bad) fats and carbs and drink coffee and colas, I just cannot do it… This sounds familiar, because it is the same […]
It's High Fructose Corn Syrup Again
Nobody wants to be a one-trick pony. Nobody wants to be viewed as a fanatic in the grip of a twisted, vendetta-like obsession against one particular villain. But, sometimes, a topic is difficult to ignore. You can’t simply mention it once and then move on. For instance, take high fructose corn syrup… Please! No, really, […]
The Price of Obesity, Physical and Psychological
Jeanna Bryner, managing editor at LiveScience, interviewed Sarah Gable, a researcher at the University of Missouri, about the emotional consequences of childhood obesity: low self-esteem from being teased or bullied, depression, anxiety, and loneliness. These stressful emotions all interfere with not only academic achievement, but every other aspect of life of a child or a teen. […]
Around the World With Junk Food Marketing
Today’s source article, “Statement on Junk Food Marketing to Children,” was published in 2004. “That isn’t news,” one might say — and one would be mistaken. Every charge it makes about the childhood obesity epidemic still holds true, so what does that say about the rate of progress in the effort to curb junk food […]
Television Advertising and Childhood Obesity, Part 2
Childhood obesity is a worldwide problem. Not long ago, Stephanie Nebehay reported for Reuters on the latest World Health Organization guidelines. A WHO spokesperson, Timothy Armstrong, is quoted as saying, The rate of increase in the developing world is greatest because of a rapid change in diet and physical activity patterns. Nebehay passes along the information […]
Medical Science and Food Addiction
(Part One of a Two-Part Post)(View Part Two) by Robert A. Pretlow, M.D. Why Does The Obesity Community Reject Addiction? In September 2009, I conducted a plenary session presentation at the European Childhood Obesity Group (ECOG) scientific meeting in Dublin, Ireland, in which I proposed that comfort eating and resulting addiction to highly pleasurable foods […]