Disinformation » Obesity

How The Food Industry Eats Your Kid’s Lunch

majestic — Sun, 04 Dec 2011 14:07:35 +0000

Lucy Komisar, who contributed the essay “Dirty Money and Global Banking Secrecy” to the disinformation anthology Everything You Know Is Wrong, contributes a major op-ed to this Sunday’s New York Times:

An increasingly cozy alliance between companies that manufacture processed foods and companies that serve the meals is making students — a captive market — fat and sick while pulling in hundreds of millions of dollars in profits. At a time of fiscal austerity, these companies are seducing school administrators with promises to cut costs through privatization. Parents who want healthier meals, meanwhile, are outgunned.

Each day, 32 million children in the United States get lunch at schools that participate in the National School Lunch Program, which uses agricultural surplus to feed children. About 21 million of these students eat free or reduced-price meals, a number that has surged since the recession. The program, which also provides breakfast, costs $13.3 billion a year.

Sadly, it is being mismanaged and exploited. About a quarter of the school nutrition program has been privatized, much of it outsourced to food service management giants like Aramark, based in Philadelphia; Sodexo, based in France; and the Chartwells division of the Compass Group, based in Britain. They work in tandem with food manufacturers like the chicken producers Tyson and Pilgrim’s, all of which profit when good food is turned to bad.

Here’s one way it works. The Agriculture Department pays about $1 billion a year for commodities like fresh apples and sweet potatoes, chickens and turkeys. Schools get the food free; some cook it on site, but more and more pay processors to turn these healthy ingredients into fried chicken nuggets, fruit pastries, pizza and the like. Some $445 million worth of commodities are sent for processing each year, a nearly 50 percent increase since 2006…

[continues in the New York Times]

Denmark Becomes First Nation With Tax On Fat In Food

JacobSloan — Tue, 04 Oct 2011 12:00:42 +0000

Is Denmark’s new fat tax a just response to the societal problems caused by obesity? Or is it sweet, buttery tyranny? Via the BBC:

Denmark has introduced what is believed to be the world’s first fat tax – a surcharge on foods that are high in saturated fat. Butter, milk, cheese, pizza, meat, oil and processed food are now subject to the tax if they contain more than 2.3% saturated fat.

Some consumers began hoarding to beat the price rise, while some producers call the tax a bureaucratic nightmare.

Danish officials say they hope the new tax will help limit the population’s intake of fatty foods.

However, some scientists think saturated fat may be the wrong target. They say salt, sugar and refined carbohydrates are more detrimental to health and should be tackled instead.

Marijuana Munchies Won’t Make You Fat

majestic — Wed, 14 Sep 2011 12:34:28 +0000

Three hash cakes made with hashish from different Amsterdam coffee shops.

Thanks to some fearless French researchers, we now know that you have nothing to fear from an attack of the munchies, reports Reuters:

Anybody who’s smoked marijuana knows about “the munchies,” that desire to eat everything within reach. But a study from France has found that, surprisingly, pot smokers are actually less likely than non-smokers to pack on weight.

Using data covering more than 50,000 U.S. adults, researchers headed by Yann Le Strat, a psychiatrist at the Louis-Mourier Hospital in Colombes, France, found that roughly 14 percent to 17 percent of the people reporting that they smoked pot at least three days per week were obese.

That compared with a 22 to 25 percent obesity rate among people who said they had not used pot in the past 12 months.

“Initially, we thought we made a mistake,” said Le Strat, adding that he and co-author Bernard Le Foll checked the results several times to make sure they were correct.

“This is only a preliminary result. It doesn’t mean that marijuana does actually help you lose weight, but perhaps there is a component that does.”…

[continues at Reuters]

Kids’ Weight Loss Book Sparks Protests

Pelliciari — Mon, 29 Aug 2011 16:01:33 +0000

It seems everyday there’s a new statistic about which country is fighting obesity, how school lunches and fast food restaurants are offering “healthy” options, and other stories about reducing the weight problem of current and future generations. But a new book about a fourteen years old girl going on a diet has sparked controversy. Discovery News reports:

An upcoming children’s book with the seemingly noninflammatory title “Maggie Goes on a Diet” is causing a firestorm of protest.

According to the book’s description on Amazon.com, “This inspiring story is about a 14-year-old who goes on a diet and is transformed from being overweight and insecure to a normal sized teen who becomes the school soccer star. Through time, exercise and hard work, Maggie becomes more and more confident and develops a positive self-image.”

You’d think that with one-third of American kids overweight or obese, and children experiencing unprecedented weight-related health problems including diabetes, a book about a girl losing weight and gaining self-esteem would be welcomed. Guess again.

Critics and reviewers are blasting the book, which has not been released and which almost no one (including myself or the experts quoted here) have fully read. It’s being called horrible, irresponsible, and dangerous.

[Continues at Discovery News]

Half of U.S. Adults Obese By 2030

majestic — Sun, 28 Aug 2011 14:35:13 +0000

Silhouettes and waist circumferences representing normal, overweight, and obese

When I mentioned this to my friend across the room she said, “I thought they already were…”

From the Washington Post:

Based on trends, half of the adults in the United States will be obese by 2030 unless the government makes changing the food environment a policy priority, according to a report released Thursday on the international obesity crisis in the British medical journal the Lancet.

Those changes include making healthful foods cheaper and less-healthful foods more expensive largely through tax strategies, the report said. Changes in the way foods are marketed would also be called for, among many other measures.

A team of international public health experts argued that the global obesity crisis will continue to grow worse and add substantial burdens to health-care systems and economies unless governments, international agencies and other major institutions take action to monitor, prevent and control the problem.

Changes over the past century in the way food is made and marketed have contributed to the creation of an “obesogenic” environment in which personal willpower and efforts to maintain a healthful weight are largely impossible, the report noted…

[continues in the Washington Post]

Antibiotic Use Tied To Obesity, Diabetes, Allergies And Asthma

majestic — Thu, 25 Aug 2011 13:29:26 +0000

Karen Kaplan reports for the Los Angeles Times:

We’ve all heard that the overuse of antibiotics is making them less effective and fueling the rise of dangerous drug-resistant bacteria. But did you know it may also be fueling the rise of obesity, diabetes, allergies and asthma?

So says Dr. Martin Blaser, microbiologist and infectious disease specialist at New York University Langone Medical Center who studies the myriad bacteria that live on and in our bodies. He explains his theory in a commentary published in Thursday’s edition of the journal Nature.

In recent years, scientists have developed a growing appreciation for the “microbiome,” the collection of mostly useful bacteria that help us digest food, metabolize key nutrients and ward off invading pathogens. Investigators have cataloged thousands of these organisms through the National Institutes of Health’s Human Microbiome Project, begun in 2008.

Blaser is interested in why so many bacteria have colonized the human body for so long – the simple fact that they have strongly suggests that they serve some useful purpose. But these bacteria have come under attack in the last 80 or so years thanks to the development of antibiotics. The drugs certainly deserve some of the credit for extending the U.S. lifespan, Blaser notes – a baby born today can expect to live 78 years, 15 years longer than a baby born in 1940. But in many respects, an antibiotic targets a particular disease the way a nuclear bomb targets a criminal, causing much collateral damage to things you’d rather not destroy…

[continues in the Los Angeles Times]

Do You Live in A ‘Food Swamp’?

ralph — Sun, 14 Aug 2011 00:38:05 +0000

Interesting article on The Week. It says that it’s really not the lack of access to healthy food (what the USDA terms a “food desert”) but living close to fast-food joints and convenience stores (i.e. a “food swamp”) is what is more influential in eating habits. People like convenience — sure, doesn’t sound like rocket science — but more telling is that fast-food restaurants outnumber supermarkets by 5 to 1 in the U.S. Americans really do like convenience, a hell of a lot. Over cost as well, it seems, since you will get a lot more bang for your buck in a supermarket. Reports The Week:

So what’s the real problem? Many people simply like fast food better. A recent University of North Carolina (UNC) study of the eating habits of 5,000 people over 15 years found that living near a supermarket had little impact on whether people had healthy diets. But living close to fast-food outlets did. The real problem, the study found, is the existence of “food swamps,” filled with convenience stores selling calorie-loaded packaged foods, gallon cups of soda, and other sugar-loaded beverages, and fast-food chains peddling burgers, fries, and fried chicken on almost every street corner. That’s no exaggeration: There are now five fast-food restaurants for every supermarket in the U.S.

Should Parents Lose Custody Of Fat Children?

JacobSloan — Wed, 13 Jul 2011 17:26:56 +0000

If your twelve-year-old is a 300-pound diabetic, have you failed as a parent to the point that your child should be taken away for his or her own safety? Health experts at Harvard say yes, it’s time to get tough and start removing fat children from their homes. It boggles the mind that we live in an age in which this is a pressing issue. The Atlantic Wire reports:

As the Western world gets fatter and fatter, the solutions to slimming it down get ever more draconian. Today, a pair of Harvard scholars writing in the Journal of the American Medical Association advocate stripping away the custody rights of parents of super obese children.

“Despite the discomfort posed by state intervention, it may sometimes be necessary to protect a child,” said Lindsey Murtagh, a lawyer and researcher at Harvard’s School of Public Health. The study’s co-author, David Ludwig, says taking away peoples’ children “ideally will support not just the child but the whole family, with the goal of reuniting child and family as soon as possible.” Ludwig, an obesity specialist at Harvard-affiliated Children’s Hospital, said his eureka moment was when a 90-pound, 3-year-old girl entered his obesity clinic a number of years ago”:

Her parents had physical disabilities, little money and difficulty controlling her weight. Last year, at age 12, she weighed 400 pounds and had developed diabetes, cholesterol problems, high blood pressure and sleep apnea.

“Out of medical concern, the state placed this girl in foster care, where she simply received three balanced meals a day and a snack or two and moderate physical activity,” he said. After a year, she lost 130 pounds. Though she is still obese, her diabetes and apnea disappeared; she remains in foster care, he said.

America Just Keeps Getting Fatter

majestic — Fri, 08 Jul 2011 15:16:18 +0000

Melissa Healy reports on a comprehensive state-by-state report titled ‘F as in Fat,’ for the Los Angeles Times:

America continues to get fatter, according to a comprehensive new report on the nation’s weight crisis. Statistics for 2008-2010 show that 16 states are experiencing steep increases in adult obesity, and none has seen a notable downturn in the last four years.

Meanwhile, cases of Type 2 diabetes and high blood pressure that health experts have long warned would result from the nation’s broadening girth and sedentary ways are becoming increasingly widespread, according to the report, titled “F as in Fat,” released Thursday.

Even Coloradans, long the nation’s slimmest citizens, are gaining excess pounds. With an obese population of 19.8% — it is the only state with an adult obesity rate below 20% — Colorado remains the caboose on the nation’s huffing, puffing train to fat land.

But in just the last four years, the ranks of the obese even in Colorado have grown 0.7%. Colorado’s hypertension rates have risen significantly as well, to 21.2% of adults.

The report, prepared by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Trust for America’s Health, is their sixth annual state-by-state accounting of obesity.

In the last 15 years, the report said, adult obesity rates have doubled or nearly doubled in 17 states. Two decades ago, not a single state had an obesity rate above 15%. Now all states do.

“When you look at it year by year, the changes are incremental,” said Jeffrey Levi, executive director of the Trust for America’s Health. But if you back up a generation and look at the slow but steady climb of Americans’ weight, he said, “you see how we got into this problem.”…

[continues in the Los Angeles Times]

Does Watching TV Lead To Obesity?

majestic — Tue, 28 Jun 2011 01:17:55 +0000

The American Academy of Pediatrics suggests there’s a causal link between watching junk food commercials on television and obesity. Alice Park reports for Time:

How much TV do your kids watch? If you don’t know, you might want to find out, say experts, since the time children spend in front of a TV or computer screen can have a profound effect on their physical and developmental health.

In a new policy statement on the role of media on obesity, the American Academy of Pediatrics’ (AAP) Council on Communications and Media warns parents that TV watching doesn’t just make children more sedentary, but also influences their eating habits, which in turn has consequences for their health. In other words, it’s not just that TV watching encourages youngsters to be less physically active, but it also exposes them to food advertisements that contribute to develop poor eating habits that can set kids up for health problems as adults.

“We created a perfect storm between media use, junk and fast food advertising, and physical inactivity,” says Dr. Victor Strasburger, professor of pediatrics at the University of New Mexico School of Medicine and member of the AAP’s Council. “We created a situation where we now have more overweight and obese adults in the U.S, than underweight and normal weight adults; it’s become an urgent public health problem.”

The policy statement highlights the fact that the harms of TV viewing go beyond promoting inactivity. More studies have shown that children who spend more time in front of the tube are more likely to eat higher-calorie foods, drink sugared sodas and grow up to be overweight adults. In a U.K. study that followed children over 30 years into adulthood, for every additional hour of TV youngsters watched on weekends at age five, their risk of being obese as adults rose by 7%. And in some cases, it doesn’t even take that long for the extra pounds to accumulate: a Japanese study found that children who watched more TV at age three were more likely to be overweight at age six…

One Quarter Of American Teens Drink Soda Every Day

majestic — Sun, 19 Jun 2011 01:23:04 +0000

For those of you wondering why America’s greatest threat is obesity, this is at least part of the answer, although the CDC is spinning it as good news. From AP via Yahoo News:

A new study shows one in four high school students drink soda every day — a sign fewer teens are downing the sugary drinks… That’s less than in the past. In the 1990s and early 2000s, more than three-quarters of teens were having a sugary drink each day, according to earlier research.

The CDC reported the figures Thursday, based on a national survey last year of more than 11,000 high school students. They appear in one of the federal agency’s publications, Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.

Consumption of sugary drinks is considered a big public health problem, and has been linked to the U.S. explosion in childhood obesity. One study of Massachusetts schoolchildren found that for each additional sweet drink per day, the odds of obesity increased 60 percent.

As a result, many schools have stopped selling soda or artificial juice to students.

Indeed, CDC data suggests that the proportion of teens who drink soda each day dropped from 29 percent in 2009 to 24 percent in 2010, at least partly as a result.

“It looks like total consumption is going down,” said Kelly Brownell, director of Yale University’s Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity.

But the results of the new CDC study are still a bit depressing, said Brownell, who has advocated for higher taxes on sodas.

“These beverages are the kinds of things that should be consumed once in a while as treat — not every day,” he said. “That’s a lot of calories.”

[continues at AP via Yahoo News]

Only In America: Purchase A Giant Pepsi To Raise Money For Diabetes Research

JacobSloan — Fri, 17 Jun 2011 17:10:49 +0000

The Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation has confirmed that this is a real promotion occurring now at KFCs across the country. Gulp down a “mega jug” of Pepsi — that’s a half gallon containing 56 spoonfuls of sugar — and one whole dollar will go towards finding a cure for the terrible disease that the drink will give you. Via Grist:

I honestly didn’t believe this one was for real at first. No way even KFC, purveyors of a sandwich that uses fried meat as a delivery mechanism for fried meat, would seriously market a soda size called the “mega jug.” And even if they did, they’d never have the chutzpah to donate “mega jug” dollars to juvenile diabetes research.

Sadly, I had totally underestimated KFC’s capacity for irony. The mega jug is a half gallon of soda, and this is a real local promotion. The Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation defends it thus: “JDRF supports research for type 1 diabetes, an autoimmune disease that results when the immune system attacks the cells in the pancreas that produce insulin, therefore requiring a child or adult with the disease to depend on insulin treatment for the rest of their lives. It is a common misconception that type 1 diabetes is caused by obesity or eating too much junk food or sweets.”

Anti-Obesity Housing Opens In New York City

JacobSloan — Mon, 13 Jun 2011 18:54:43 +0000

The apartment complex in the Bronx is designed to help curb the residents’ obesity, with features such as “inviting” stairways. But, how does one make stairways inviting to people disinclined to use them, other than with, say, cups of soft serve awaiting on each landing? Blisstree writes:

Can the building you live in help you lose weight? That’s the idea behind NYC’s new “anti-obesity” apartment complex, an eight-story Bronx building called “The Melody” that was unveiled last week. The building was put up by a private development company, not the city, but units are only available to families making under $90,000 per year. It has a gym on the first floor, exercise equipment for adults and children out back, and “inviting” stairways to encourage residents to avoid elevators. Motivational slogans and signs hang on the walls.

I don’t think this will do much in the way of combating obesity — the kind of person who chooses to buy a condo in a fitness-friendly complex is probably someone who’s already concerned with diet and exercise. And if they’re not — well, the most inviting stairways in the world aren’t likely to make a difference.

Asthma Rate Rising Sharply in U.S.

BananaFamine — Sun, 15 May 2011 01:25:15 +0000

Peak flow meters used to measure expiration speed.

Roni Caryn Rabin writes in the New York Times:

Americans are suffering from asthma in record numbers, according to a study released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Nearly one in 10 children and almost one in 12 Americans of all ages now has asthma, government researchers said.

According to the report, from 2001 to 2009 the prevalence of asthma increased among all demographic groups studied, including men, women, whites, blacks and Hispanics. Black children are most acutely affected: the study found that 17 percent of black children — nearly one in five — had a diagnosis of asthma in 2009, up from 11.4 percent, or about one in nine, in 2001.

While officials at the Centers for Disease Control emphasized that asthma could be controlled if managed effectively, they were at a loss to explain why it had become more widespread even as important triggers like cigarette smoking had become less common.

“We don’t know exactly why the number is going up, but, importantly, we know there are measures individuals with asthma can take to control symptoms,” said Ileana Arias, principal deputy director of the centers.

For more information, see original article.

Religious Americans Twice As Likely To Become Obese

majestic — Fri, 25 Mar 2011 00:02:32 +0000

Is this why mostly secular Europe’s citizens are so much skinnier than still religious America’s? Courtney Hutchison reports for ABC News:

Americans who are religious are more likely to be happy, healthy … and hefty?

According to research from Northwestern University, youths of a healthy weight who frequently participated in religious activities were twice as likely to become obese by middle age than their less-religious peers.

Even when controlling for race, sex, education and income — several factors that could independently be affecting likelihood of obesity, this affect remained. Researchers drew on data from the Coronary Artery Risk Development in Young Adults study, which tracked weight and a number of physical and behavioral variables, including religious involvement, in more than 2,000 men and women over the past two decades.

“We had previously found that those with high religious involvement were more likely to be obese [as middle-aged or older adults], but we wanted to follow people over time to make sure that people who are religious are more likely to become obese, not that people who weigh more are more likely to turn to religion,” said Mathew Feinstein, lead author of the study and an M.D. candidate at Northwestern University…

[continues at ABC News]

Mark Frauenfelder: ‘Passport Ownership Prevents Diabetes’

ralph — Wed, 09 Mar 2011 04:52:04 +0000

Mark Frauenfelder of BoingBoing writes, “It’s conclusive: owning a passport will prevent you from becoming diabetic.”

More Than Half Of America’s Pets Are Obese

majestic — Wed, 23 Feb 2011 13:27:32 +0000

The obesity epidemic is spreading from man to man’s best friend — in America at least. The Association for Pet Obesity Prevention (APOP) reports that:

Obesity continues to expand in both pets and people according to the latest pet obesity study. The fourth annual Association for Pet Obesity Prevention (APOP) National Pet Obesity Awareness Day Study found approximately 53% of cats and 55% of dogs were overweight or obese. Preliminary data released from a nationwide collaboration with Banfield, the nation’s largest chain of veterinary clinics, reveals pet obesity continues to be a serious problem. APOP founder Dr. Ernie Ward remarks, “This year’s data suggests that our pets are getting fatter. We’re seeing a greater percentage of obese pets than ever before.”

32% of cats in the preliminary sample were classified as overweight by their veterinarian and 21.6% were observed to be clinically obese or greater than 30% of normal body weight. 35% of dogs were found to be overweight and 20.6% obese. “While the general trend of overweight pets has remained fairly steady at around 50%, the number of obese pets is growing. This is troubling because it means more pets will be affected by weight-related diseases such as arthritis, diabetes, high blood pressure and kidney disease costing pet owners millions in avoidable medical costs.”

The group began conducting nationwide veterinary surveys in 2007 and has seen a steady increase in the percentage of pets classified as obese or at least 30% above normal body weight. In 2007, roughly 19% of cats were found to be obese by their veterinarian and in 2010 that number increased to almost 22%. For dogs, obesity rates escalated from just over 10% in 2007 to 20% in 2010. “One of the reasons we think the obesity rate for dogs has dramatically increased is due to a better understanding of what an obese dog looks like. Veterinarians also realize how critical it is to tell a pet owner when their dog is in danger due to its weight.” comments Ward…

[continues at The Association for Pet Obesity Prevention site]

Is United States No Longer The Fattest Nation?

Pelliciari — Fri, 11 Feb 2011 19:53:43 +0000

This doesn’t mean that Americans are curbing their appetite or exercising more, the rest of the world is just getting fatter. Peter Smith at Good Magazine writes:

It’s not exactly good news, but the United States is no longer the world’s fattest nation. It turns out that the rest of the world is gaining on us, putting on more weight at a faster pace. This is especially true in Pacific island nations and in the Middle East, where the United Arab Emirates Kuwait now represents the world’s fattest industrialized nation. Both regions seem to be struggling to adapt to modern, sedentary lifestyles over a rather short period of time.

The most recent data comes from an exhaustive country-by-country report on obesity from the Imperial College London, Harvard University, and the World Health Organization, which was published in The Lancet. A Body Mass Index (shown on the x and y axis above) is a measure of body fat based on height and weight. A score of 25 to 30 corresponds with being overweight (represented by the light tan box above), while above 30 is obese (the dark tan box). As you can see, Pacific islanders (purple dots) had the highest BMI levels. Most of Europe (green dots) appears to be overweight, especially men (those green dots below the dotted line).

[Continues at Good Magazine]

When Body Fat Affects Report Cards

Pelliciari — Wed, 19 Jan 2011 20:47:23 +0000

If you were an elementary school student, which would upset you more: being picked on as the fat kid in class or having the teacher mention it on your report card? The Chicago Tribune reports:

Elmhurst students have long been checked on how long it takes to run a mile or whether they can do a pushup. But another physical fitness assessment tool has some parents fuming — one that aims at finding out whether their kids are too hefty.

A child’s “body mass index,” a computation of body fat based on height and weight, was one of six tests used at Hawthorne Elementary School to determine the physical fitness grade on a student’s progress report.

But that practice ended abruptly Tuesday after about 25 parents met with school officials to express their displeasure with how the BMI data were being used. One mother broke into tears as she described how it affected her fourth-grade daughter.

[Continues at Chicago Tribune]

New Years Resolution, Diets And Obesity

Pelliciari — Mon, 03 Jan 2011 22:25:38 +0000

New Years is a celebration of starting over, the time when many people make resolutions to improve the following year. The most popular resolution in America is to lose weight and be more healthy. According to disinformation’s book 50 Facts That Should Change the USA, written by Stephen Fender, it is also the least kept resolution. With Fact #40: 65% of American adults are overweight, 30% are obese, and these proportions are growing, Americans should reconsider how they keep their resolutions throughout the whole year:

65% of American Adults Are Overweight, 30% Are Obese, And These Proportions Are Growing

“I myself am very well in body, mind spirits, quite stout,” an immigrant wrote from Pittsburgh to his brother back in Manchester, England in 1837. “I weigh 182 lbs so you may think how I am, a man of my size. Am very corpulent.” Those were the days—when fat was a sign of success and prosperity. What he meant was that he had made it in the New World, and left the lean years in the Old forever.

Nowadays, of course, fatness means something very different. For us the sight of people waddling through shopping malls, trying to squeeze into a booth in an all-you-can-eat-for-$14.95 restaurant or spreading out across two seats in a crowded bus brings out all kinds of disapproval. We take it as a sign of slovenly living, laziness, lack of exercise, ignorance of proper eating, even a sort of moral collapse.

Like poverty, to which it is related, obesity is a comparative measurement. According to the American Obesity Association, source of these headline figures, anyone with a body mass index (BMI) between 25 and 29.9 is overweight. From 30 to 39.9 you are obese and suffering from a clinical condition. Over 40, you are severely obese and probably need a forklift truck to get around. Severe obesity has risen too—from 2.9 percent of the population in 1988–1994 to 4.7 currently.

Obesity is not just a matter of appearance and convenience. The medical effects can be pretty horrendous too. By 2006 it was killing some 400,000 Americans a year, just a shade behind, and rapidly catching up with, the total for cigarette smokers, 435,000, as the chief cause of preventable death in the country. Killer diseases associated with obesity include Type 2 diabetes, coronary heart disease, high blood pressure and—in postmenopausal women—breast cancer. Less immediately threatening but still serious are osteoarthritis, decreased fertility in women due to menstrual irregularities, and obstructive sleep apnea—that is, loud snoring and irregular breathing during deep sleep, causing excessive daytime sleepiness, personality changes, decreased memory, impotence and depression.

Though an increasing phenomenon in many developed countries, obesity is now an acute problem in the U.S. Why in America especially? The usual explanation is that we eat too much convenience and fast food loaded with fat and carbohydrates, and get too little exercise. Given that many of us would drive our cars to bed if only we could get them up the stairs, there may be something in this simple reasoning. But simple answers won’t do for a country so ready to believe in dastardly plots perpetrated by “them”—in this case the global food industry and fast-food moguls.

According to the paranoid explanation, what really makes us fat are monosodium glutamate (MSG), hydrolyzed vegetable protein and other taste-enhancers added to American convenience foods. These stimulate the pancreas to produce insulin, which in turn promotes the body to lay down fat. They also stimulate cravings, leaving us wanting more of the same. This notion satisfies because it seems to explain so much. MSG or other so-called “excititoxins” are in virtually everything Americans eat, from canned soups and frozen prepared meals, to proprietary gravies and salad dressings—not to mention nearly every menu item on fast-food outlets like Burger King, McDonald’s, Wendy’s and Taco Bell. But then again, so are the fats and carbohydrates that actually do the business.

With obesity so widespread, you’d think we’d at least try to keep our children from getting fat. But excess weight seems to run in families. According to the American Obesity Association, “around 30 percent of children aged from six to nineteen are overweight, and another 15 percent are obese.” No doubt the chief element in this sorry statistic is the family diet, but in case mothers want to keep their kids from eating badly, the convenience and fast-food producers are making their own end run round the parental line, appealing to the next generation directly via television. With kids now responsible—either directly or through nagging power over parents—for over $500 billion spending annually, anti fast-food campaigner Eric Schlosser has written, “American children now see a junk food ad every five minutes while watching TV.” Maybe there’s some point to that paranoia after all.

But all this debate over causes and effects ignores another factor connected with American obesity. What the usual obesity sources fail to mention is that poverty in America has been increasing at more or less the same rate (though at a lower level) as obesity. Present levels of American poverty stand at 34.5 million people, or 12.7 percent of the population. This figure includes 13.5 million children.

Furthermore, obesity and poverty are linked. This sounds counter-intuitive. We are used to images of poverty in the form of thin-faced children with their ribs showing staring out of an appeal for African aid. Even the experts seem to have been taken aback by this recent discovery, since they have labeled the phenomenon “the hunger-obesity paradox.”

The real surprise is why the connection between poverty and obesity should have come as such a surprise. It’s obvious that poor households are going to buy the tastiest and most filling foods they can find on a limited budget. That means sugary soft drinks, pizza, doughnuts, hamburgers and salty, starchy snacks like pretzels and potato chips. When whole days go by without enough food, the body stores up fat to tide it over through the “lean” period. This may be the vestige of a hunter-gatherer metabolism.

In his study, “Does Hunger Cause Obesity?” W. H. Dietz cites the case of a mother on food stamps who didn’t have enough money to satisfy her daughter’s hunger for half of every month. For the remaining two weeks she would make up the difference with high-fat, high-starch, filling foods. The seven-year-old girl was 220 percent the normal weight for her age and size.

The writer Fujioka Kim, who quotes this example, points out that a woman and two children driving home from the supermarket could take the edge off their appetites with a 16 ounce bag of potato chips costing $1.99 and a bottle of soda bought on sale for 99¢. For the same money they could have bought three apples and a quart bottle of soy milk. Far fewer calories, more nutrition. Ms. Kim offers a few “easy, inexpensive but healthy recipes” from her own Japanese American background. These include “ninjin salad”—shredded raw carrot with lemon juice squeezed over it—and “hiya-yakko”—tofu (bean curd) covered with chopped scallions, ground sesame and a few drops of soy sauce.

Well, maybe sensible eating will catch on even among the poor. But the economic pressure of poverty and the emotional response to it, especially when children come into the equation, form a complex dynamic of motivations which would be condescending to expect to play like an instrument. If poor people don’t feed their children “sensibly,” that isn’t necessarily because they are stupid or uninformed about good nutrition. Apart from the economic hurdles in the way of low-calorie, high-nutritional eating, there is what we might call the “treat factor” to consider. Parents may feel the need to give their kids a treat to make up for things missing elsewhere in their lives.

One place to test the treat factor is in the fast-food market, since it is here that people eat as a break from their routines. Increasingly sensitive to the criticism that they were undermining the nation’s health with hamburgers, french fries and sweet drinks, fast-food outlets began to introduce “healthy options” like fresh fruit and vegetables to their menus. McDonald’s began to add “fruit ‘n’ walnut” salads and grilled (instead of deep-fried) chicken, to the range offered, later pushing the health-agenda envelope out to carrot sticks and toasted deli sandwiches.

As a result—apparently—McDonald’s Corp.’s earnings for January to June 2006 jumped by 17 percent over the previously half year. But two months later, after 29 years with the company, Mike Roberts, the chief backer of these innovations, suddenly resigned, leaving seasoned observers of the industry puzzled. Did he know something they didn’t know?

Maybe he doubted whether the healthy revolution could last. Already parts of this extremely fast moving market have turned against healthy eating at the fast-food outlets. “We listened to consumers who said they wanted to eat fresh fruit,” said a spokesman for Wendy’s, “but apparently they lied.” Now hamburgers are meatier, cheesier, thicker than ever, and there’s not a blade of lettuce in sight—let alone tofu topped with soy sauce and spring onions. Hardee’s now offers a “Monster Thickburger” consisting of two beef patties, each with cheese and bacon on top. Burger King has gone two better, with their new “Stacker Quad”—four layers of hamburger, and cheese, topped with bacon, packing in as much saturated fat as three Big Macs. And sales are singing.

Four Reasons To Avoid High Fructose Corn Syrup

Easy Rider — Wed, 29 Dec 2010 06:01:07 +0000

Via Yahoo News:

By now, you’ve more than likely seen one of the ads put out by the Corn Refiners Association. The ads tell the story of a “natural” sweetener made from corn. They go on to insinuate that high fructose corn syrup has been unfairly portrayed and that this truly American ingredient is fine in moderation.

Lloyd wrote about this massive $30 million ad campaign last year. The campaign claims that high fructose corn syrup has the “same natural sweeteners as table sugar and honey.” Since then, the association has released a number of ads with the same message.

But when push comes to shove, what are the facts about high fructose corn syrup? How is it made? Is it healthy in moderation to the body and the planet? Here are the facts, so that the next time you’re asked, you can confidently dispel any high fructose corn syrup rumors.

1. The process of making high fructose corn syrup is pretty weird

First of all, there’s nothing natural about high fructose corn syrup, and it most certainly does not exist in nature.

The process starts off with corn kernels, yes, but then that corn is spun at a high velocity and combined with three other enzymes: alpha-amylase, glucoamylase, and xylose isomerase, so that it forms a thick syrup that’s way sweeter than sugar and super cheap to produce.

That’s why it’s poured into a huge majority of mass pproduced processed foods.

2. High fructose corn syrup does weird stuff to your body

While the commercials claim that it’s fine in moderation, the truth is that the whole problem with high fructose corn syrup in the first place, is that moderation is seemingly impossible.

The syrup interferes with the body’s metabolism so that a person can’t stop eating. It’s truly hard to control cravings because high fructose corn syrup slows down the secretion of leptin in the body. Leptin is a crucial hormone in the body that tells you that you’re full and to stop eating.

That’s why it’s so closely associated with obesity in this country. It’s like an addictive drug.

3. There might be mercury in your corn syrup

And what about the rumors of mercury being found in corn syrup?

I wrote last year that according to MSNBC in one study, published in the Journal of Environmental Health, former Food and Drug Administration scientist Renee Dufault and colleagues tested 20 samples of high fructose corn syrup and found detectable mercury in nine of the 20 samples.

“We went and looked at supermarket samples where high fructose corn syrup was the first or second ingredient on the label,” Dr. David Wallinga, a food safety researcher and activist at the nonprofit Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy said. These 55 different foods included barbecue sauce, jam, yogurt, and chocolate syrup. “We found about one out of three had mercury above the detection limit,” Wallinga said.

4. The environmental impact of high fructose corn syrup is huge

Most corn is grown as a monoculture, meaning that the land is used solely for corn, not rotated among crops. Large monocultures, which are usually genetically modified, can be riddled with pests.

As a result, monocultures are often dressed with a toxic cocktail of pesticides so that they can survive. Monocultures can deplete the nutrients in soil and lead to erosion.

In addition, the pesticides used to grow them pollute our soil and ground water.

Fat Friends May Make You Fat

majestic — Fri, 05 Nov 2010 14:11:22 +0000

What’s the old adage — you are the company you keep? From Reuters:

Americans will keep growing fatter until 42 percent of the nation is considered obese, and having fat friends is part of the problem, researchers said on Thursday.

The prediction by a team of researchers at Harvard University contradicts other experts who say the nation’s obesity rate has peaked at 34 percent of the U.S. population.

The finding is from the same group, led by Nicholas Christakis, that reported in 2007 that if someone’s friend becomes obese, that person’s chances of becoming obese increase by more than half.

They now think this same phenomenon is driving the obesity epidemic, which will climb slowly but steadily for the next 40 years.

Alison Hill, a graduate student at Harvard and the Harvard-Massachusetts Institute of Technology Division of Health Sciences and Technology, said the study is based on the idea that obesity can spread like an infectious disease and people can catch it from their friends…

[continues at Reuters]

San Francisco Bans McDonald’s Happy Meal

Pelliciari — Wed, 03 Nov 2010 18:47:06 +0000

San Francisco has enacted a law prohibiting restaurants from giving toys away with high-fat and sugary meals, including the American staple: the Happy Meal. This was done in hopes that children won’t opt for unhealthy food just because they receive a toy as well. The New York Daily News reports:

The McDonald’s Happy Meal went the way of Prop. 19 in San Francisco Tuesday when the city’s board of supervisors voted to forbid restaurants from offering toys with meals that contain too much fat and sugar.

Restaurants would also need to provide fruits and vegetables with meals that come with free toys. The city said the measure was an effort to combat childhood obesity.

“We’re part of a movement that is moving forward an agenda of food justice,” Supervisor Eric Mar told the Los Angeles Times. “From San Francisco to New York City, the epidemic of childhood obesity in this country is making our kids sick, particularly kids from low income neighborhoods, at an alarming rate.”

The rule, scheduled to take effect in December, says that restaurants may include a toy with a meal it contains fewer than 600 calories – food and drink combined — and if less than 35% of the calories come from fat, The Times reported.

McDonald’s spokeswoman Danya Proud said in a statement that the company was “extremely disappointed” with the decision.

Continues at New York Daily News …

Are Parents Less Loving Towards Fat Children?

JacobSloan — Mon, 18 Oct 2010 17:24:23 +0000

In a nation suffering from a childhood obesity epidemic, this is bad news for the youth of the future: whether or not they intend to be, parents are meaner to their overweight children. TIME writes:

It’s no secret that overweight kids are typically not the most popular kids on the block. Nor is it news that kids can be mean, forming groups of “haves” and “have-nots,” gossiping, ostracizing their chunky classmates.

You’d think that home would be a safe haven for them, but a new study in the journal Obesity reveals that even parents can come down hard on their heftier offspring.

Researchers at the University of North Texas in Denton have found that parents may be less likely to chip in and help their overweight kid buy a car. “No one is going to be surprised that society discriminates against the overweight, but I think it is surprising that it can come from your parents,” researcher Adriel Boals told Reuters.

With the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention classifying 20% of children and 18% of teens as obese, that’s a lot of kids who could potentially get short-changed. In the current study, the researchers looked at 379 college students and discovered that those who paid for their cars themselves had a higher average body mass index in relation to students whose parents helped with the purchase. When they trained their sights on the 82 students who paid for their cars without assistance, they found that 39% qualified as overweight or obese versus 18% in the group that got a financial leg up. Neither gender nor family income played into why parents were more willing to help out their svelter offspring.

Regardless, parents might want to think twice before they’re mean to their chubby children. What comes around often goes around, and the latest stats show one-third of Americans are overweight and another third are obese.

Late Night TV and Web Surfing Can Cause Obesity

majestic — Wed, 13 Oct 2010 15:17:41 +0000

Source: CAD-Comic.com (CC)

Although recent research suggests that obesity may be partly genetic, intuitively one feels that being a late night TV couch potato or site surfer can’t help. The LA Times reports on a study showing just that, but with an unexpected twist:

Researchers already know that people who stay up late watching TV, playing video games or surfing the Web have an increased risk of becoming obese. The thought was that all that sedentary awake time amounted to more opportunities to snack, and thus to put on pounds.

But a study published online Monday says another mechanism may be at work too – the additional exposure to light at night messes with one’s circadian rhythm and throws the body’s metabolism out of whack.

To prove that light at night actually causes obesity, researchers from Ohio State University and University of Haifa in Israel kept three groups of mice. One group followed the normal pattern of 16 hours of full light and eight hours of dark; another group had 16 hours of full light and eight hours of dim light; the third group was exposed to full light for 24 hours in a row…

All three groups of mice ate the same amount of chow, and they all got the same amount of exercise. However, after just one week, the mice in the two groups that never experienced total darkness weighed significantly more than the mice who had a normal light-dark schedule. The gap persisted over the eight weeks of the study, and by the end they weighed about 10% more.

Extra grams weren’t the only issue. Halfway through the experiment, the dim-light and full-light mice also experienced “impaired glucose tolerance,” according to the study, which was published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. …

[continues in the LA Times]

Scientists Report An Array Of Obesity Genes

majestic — Sun, 10 Oct 2010 22:28:43 +0000

Well maybe obesity is genetic, after all, per this report from U.S. News & World Report:

Scientists have found genes that appear to play a role in the propensity for obesity.

The findings are reported in two new studies published in the Oct. 10 online edition of Nature Genetics.

In one report, researchers say they have identified 18 gene variants linked to obesity and confirmed the involvement of 14 others. In a second report, the same group of researchers say they have identified 13 gene variants that appear to direct fat to the belly or thighs.

“We have made a big leap forward in identifying new gene variations that contribute to the susceptibility to obesity and susceptibility to store fat more on your hips or more on your waist,” said researcher Ruth Loos, a group leader in the Genetic Aetiology of Obesity Program in the MRC Epidemiology Unit at the Institute of Metabolic Science, in Cambridge, U.K.

Loos cautioned that these genes cannot be used to predict whether an individual will become obese or not. Right now, they have identified genes linked to obesity, but exactly how these genes work in developing a vulnerability to obesity isn’t known, she added.

“But if we know the biology, perhaps we can invent a more effective preventive strategy. Maybe we can identify proteins that we can target with drugs,” Loos said. “It’s going to take years before these new discoveries will develop into new interventions.”

In addition, having these gene variants doesn’t mean that an individual is definitely going to be obese. “The prediction is not much better than just flipping a coin,” Loos said…

[continues at U.S. News & World Report]

Obesity In Children Caused By Common Cold Virus

majestic — Thu, 30 Sep 2010 19:32:29 +0000

Photo: Walter Siegmund (CC)

Nothing to do with eating too many high-fructose corn syrup-laden foods and gallons of sugary drinks, of course! Hard to believe this is a serious story, but here it is from Discovery News:

Childhood obesity is not only an epidemic, it may be an infectious disease transmitted by a common cold virus, a new study suggests.

Children exposed to adenovirus-36 were more likely to be obese than were children who had no evidence of infection, according to a study published online Sept. 20 in Pediatrics. The new study is the latest to link the virus to obesity in people. Recent studies of Korean children and both American and Italian adults have shown that obese people are more likely to have antibodies against the virus — a sign of a prior infection — than normal-weight people are.

Adenoviruses are some of the many viruses responsible for causing colds and stomach ailments in people.

In the new study, 67 obese and 57 normal-weight children ranging in age from 8 to 18 were tested for the presence of antibodies against adenovirus-36 in their blood. Researchers led by Jeffrey Schwimmer, a pediatric gastroenterologist at the University of California, San Diego, and Rady Children’s Hospital San Diego, found antibodies in 19 of the children. Of those children found to carry the antibody, 15 were obese and four were of normal weight.

Not only were obese children more likely to have antibodies to the virus — 22 percent of obese children had antibodies compared with 7 percent of normal-weight kids — but the obese kids with evidence of prior adenovirus-36 infections were on average about 35 pounds fatter than obese children who hadn’t caught the virus…

[continues at Discovery News]

Even Your Pants Are Lying To You?

ralph — Wed, 08 Sep 2010 16:27:14 +0000

I don’t believe Disinformation’s first book, the Russ Kick anthology You Are Being Lied To, (now updated as You Are STILL Being Lied To), covered fashion, but this story made me think of it. Wow, as Americans, it seems that we don’t want to accept even the truth about ourselves right beneath our noses. Abram Sauer writes on Esquire:

I’ve never been slim — I played offensive line in high school — but I’m no cow either. (I’m happily a “Russell Crowe” body type.) So I immediately went across the street, bought a tailor’s measuring tape, and trudged from shop to shop, trying on various brands’ casual dress pants. It took just two hours to tear my self-esteem to smithereens and raise some serious questions about what I later learned is called “vanity sizing.”

Your pants have been deceiving you for years. And the lies are compounding:

Michelle Obama Program Blames Sony PlayStation For Making America’s Children Fat

majestic — Tue, 07 Sep 2010 20:45:53 +0000

A great post from disinformation friend and neighbor Nicholas Deleon, over at Crunchgear:

Consuming more calories than you use makes you fat. That’s a fact, Jack. Figuring out where these calories come from, OK, that’s a noble endeavor, but let’s not pretend there’s anything secret going on here. Like, you see this graphic here? It’s the winner of some Michelle Obama-headed design contest to help folks figure out how to best fight childhood obesity. And you’ll see the PlayStation completely demonized, as if Sony itself is somehow responsible for little kids packing on the pounds.

The chart, part of the Let’s Move program (and you’ll want to see the full-res version), highlights a few bad guys, including the use of high fructose corn syrup in soda, the launch of Super Size-sized foods at McDonalds, the increase in screen-watching hours, and, yes, the launch of the Sony PlayStation.

Surely Nintendo and Microsoft are thrilled with the award-winning chart…

[continues at Crunchgear]

Want To Lose Weight? Simple – Drink Water!

majestic — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 12:45:39 +0000

Photo: Matthew Bowden (www.digitallyrefreshing.com)

Can it really be this easy? It certainly won’t cost much to try it out (just don’t use bottled water!). From Business Week:

Close the diet books and skip the pills. The latest weight-loss trick may be as simple as gulping a couple of glasses of water before you eat.

A new study found that middle-aged and older adults who drank two cups of water before each meal consumed fewer calories and lost more weight than those who skipped drinking water.

Researchers divided two groups of overweight and obese men and women aged 55 to 75 into two groups: one group was told to follow a low-fat, low-calorie diet; the other group was told to follow the same diet and to drink two cups of water before breakfast, lunch and dinner.

After 12 weeks, those who drank water before meals had lost 15.5 pounds, compared to 11 pounds for the non-water drinkers, a nearly 30 percent difference.

The researchers got the idea for the weight-loss program from their prior research, which found that when middle-aged and older adults drank water before meals, they ate between 75 and 90 fewer calories at the meal.

What they weren’t sure about, however, was if water drinkers would compensate by eating more throughout the rest of the day, said senior study author Brenda Davy, an associate professor in the department of human nutrition, foods and exercise at Virginia Tech. But after 12 weeks of dieting, that didn’t happen…

[continues at Business Week]