obesity epidemic

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Fat Friends Eat More Together

(Newser) - Overweight kids eat more when they eat with their overweight friends, Newsweek reports. A new study tested a child's consumption of healthy snacks and junk food while in the company of a friend or stranger who was either fat or lean. Overweight kids eating with a chubby buddy ate more...

Why Congress Won't Face the Fat Problem
 Why Congress Won't 
 Face the Fat Problem 
analysis
Jul 30, 2009 11:10 AM CDT

Why Congress Won't Face the Fat Problem

Lawmakers fear giving US 'bad news'—especially while munching Doritos

(Newser) - Congress is “in denial” on one key health issue: obesity, writes Lisa Lerer for Politico. Obesity-related illnesses reportedly cost $147 billion, or 10% of medical spending, last year—and lawmakers say they’re focused on cost-cutting. But, experts say, “no one wants to tell Americans the bad news....

Let's Do to Big Food What We Did to Big Tobacco
Let's Do to Big Food
What We Did to Big Tobacco
OPINION
Jul 24, 2009 11:30 AM CDT

Let's Do to Big Food What We Did to Big Tobacco

'Big Food' and 'Big Tobacco' have a lot in common

(Newser) - After decades of anti-smoking campaigns, Big Tobacco has been brought low and ashtrays have “gone the way of spittoons,” writes Ellen Goodman of the Boston Globe. It’s high time we gave Big Food the same treatment. “Now that two-thirds of Americans are overweight, the lethal effects...

I Think, Therefore I Overeat
 I Think, 
 Therefore 
 I Overeat 
GLOSSIES
Jul 18, 2009 8:09 PM CDT

I Think, Therefore I Overeat

New fleet of books tries to explain American obesity

(Newser) - As the waistlines of Americans continue to expand, so is the genre of literature seeking to explain why, Elizabeth Kolbert writes in the New Yorker, profiling no fewer than seven books on the subject—including one that endorses “fat power.” The Fat Studies Reader argues that the real...

Mississippi Still Porkiest, but Alabama Closing In

Obesity up in 23 states: report

(Newser) - Mississippi's still king of cellulite, but an ominous tide is rolling toward the Medicare doctors in neighboring Alabama: obese baby boomers. It's time for the nation's annual obesity rankings and, outside of fairly lean Colorado, there's little good news. Obesity rates among adults rose in 23 states over the past...

Marriage Makes You Fat: Study
 Marriage Makes You Fat: Study 
Jun 29, 2009 1:41 PM CDT

Marriage Makes You Fat: Study

(Newser) - As couples grow more committed to each other, their waistlines often grow as well, Time reports. During their first few years of matrimony, couples are twice as likely to become obese as their dating peers, according to a new study being published next month. If they merely move in with...

Add a Little Weight, Gain 6-7 Years: Study

(Newser) - Being a touch on the heavy side could help you live an extra few years, Japanese researchers say. People who were a little overweight at 40 lived 6 to 7 years longer than those who were very thin at that age, AFP reports. The very thin had a life expectancy...

20% of 4-Year-Olds Already Obese: Study

(Newser) - A striking new study says almost 1 in 5 American 4-year-olds is obese, and the rate is alarmingly higher among American Indian children, with nearly a third of them obese. Researchers were surprised to see differences by race at so early an age. Obesity is more common in Hispanic and...

Study: Obesity as Bad as Smoking
Study: Obesity as Bad as Smoking 
Mar 18, 2009 2:09 AM CDT

Study: Obesity as Bad as Smoking

Being extremely overweight can trim a decade from lifespans

(Newser) - Obesity can take years off a life, and in some cases is as dangerous to health as smoking, reports USA Today. Researchers analyzing studies involving almost a million people found that obese adults died an average of three years earlier than people with a healthy body-mass index. Extremely obese adults—...

New Treatment Resurrects Weight-Loss Drug

Leptin, once written off, could make comeback in combination treatment

(Newser) - Researchers may have found a way to treat obesity with leptin—the appetite-suppressant once hailed, then dismissed, as a cure to America’s bulging belly. An area of brain cells seemingly stressed by obesity allowed the obese to build up resistance to leptin, Reuters reports, but by injecting drugs to...

Diet Trumps Exercise in Obesity Fight

Physical activity seems not to be 'primary driver' of obesity: researchers

(Newser) - Diet is more important than exercise when it comes to reducing obesity, LiveScience reports. A new study compared African American women living in Chicago, who weighed an average of 184 pounds, with women in rural Nigeria, who weighed 127. Contrary to researchers' expectations, the Nigerians were not any more physically...

Psst, Fat Boy: Uncle Sam Wants You

Military tells recruits with high BMI that they can sign up now, lose weight later

(Newser) - To reel in more recruits, the US Army is relaxing weight restrictions on would-be soldiers. A waiver program gives outsize volunteers a year after signing up to get in shape, measured by body-mass index, or be booted, the Christian Science Monitor reports. With the youthful population consuming more and exercising...

Healthiest US City Gets Moving
 Healthiest US City Gets Moving 
Nov 17, 2008 2:27 PM CST

Healthiest US City Gets Moving

Burlington, Vt., tops list due to active citizens; Huntington, W.Va., is unhealthiest

(Newser) - Burlington, Vt., is America's healthiest city, with 92% of residents reporting that they're in good or great health. A number of factors account for the gap between Burlington and Huntington, W.Va., which brought up the rear in the CDC's healthy-city rankings, the AP reports. Burlington's residents are younger on...

W.Va. Town Is Nation's Tubbiest

Economic troubles, lifestyle traditions distract from rampant obesity

(Newser) - Dietary tradition helps make Huntington, W.Va., the nation's most obese and unhealthy city, the AP reports. The five-county area, where poverty rates are high, boasts many pizza and hot dog joints—but Huntington's mayor will not follow the lead of New York City and ban trans fats in restaurants....

Brain Offers a Clue on Why Obese People Eat More

(Newser) - New research takes an accepted truth about obese people and flips it upside down: They may, in fact, get less pleasure out of eating than people of normal weight, the LA Times reports. Researchers found that people who have weaker reward circuitry in the brain tend to overeat. Thus, while...

Gas Prices Fuel Bike-Sale Boom
 Gas Prices Fuel Bike-Sale Boom 
Sep 19, 2008 1:17 PM CDT

Gas Prices Fuel Bike-Sale Boom

(Newser) - The world's biggest bicycle maker is having its best year ever, thanks to high oil prices and concerns about both global warming and obesity, the Economist reports. Taiwan-based Giant sells 7% of the world's bikes—460,000 last month—and can't keep up with demand in some markets. New York...

UK Weighs Taking Fat Kids From Parents

Dangerously chubby children may end up in social service system

(Newser) - Local government leaders in Britain warn that they may need to take drastic action to protect the health of dangerously overweight children—including taking them away from their parents, the Independent reports. They predict that a million British children will be clinically obese within four years, and that the social...

Every American Will Be Fat by 2048: Study

And 86% by 2030. That means you. And you. And you.

(Newser) - The US will face a health disaster by 2030 when 86% of Americans will be overweight, with every single resident tipping the scales by 2048, according to a new study. Skyrocketing metabolic diseases will cost some $950 billion more annually, accounting for $1 in every $6 spent on health care,...

'Obesity Gene' Linked to Runaway Appetite

Children in study had harder time feeling full

(Newser) - Children who carry a version of a gene linked to obesity have a more difficult time telling when they're full, researchers have found. Earlier studies discovered that adults with two copies of the higher obesity risk version of the FTO gene were nearly 7 pounds heavier than a control group....

Childhood Obesity Rate Levels Off

Researchers report first 'glimmer of hope' in decades

(Newser) - The rate of childhood obesity appears to have peaked, providing the first "glimmer of hope" on the problem in decades, federal researchers say. About 15% of kids ages 2 to 19 are obese, a slight decrease from the percentage in 1999, the Washington Post reports. It's the first time...

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