Dr. Jay Parkinson, who you may remember from issue 13, thinks we need to stop pussyfooting around the issue of obesity in America. In a recent blog post he asks: "If obesity is linked so closely to so many of the top 10 diseases that kill Americans, why don't we have PSAs saying 'Obesity Kills?' Why aren't we, as a culture, condemning obesity just as we condemn crack and smoking?" He goes on to explain that 95 percent of obesity is the result of food addiction, and wonders about things like a "fat tax" for high fructose corn syrup, and if we should erase "obese" from our vocabulary in favor of the more direct-and possibly more motivating-"fat."Given that poor eating habits are so closely related with severe (and preventable) health problems, it does seem like a problem that needs addressing. Is this aggressive approach the right one, or can you think of something better?Photo (cc) by Flickr user dotbenjamin.
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