Washington Post obesity series

The Washington Post has an ongoing series about obesity that is worth noting. Here are the links to the mainbars from the series. Here is a blog post by nutrition activist Marion Nestle about the series.


Obesity threatens a generation - Saturday, May 17
The lede:

An epidemic of obesity is compromising the lives of millions of American children, with burgeoning problems that reveal how much more vulnerable young bodies are to the toxic effects of fat.


Inertia at the top - Monday, May 19
The lede:

The problem at first was that the problem was ignored: For almost two decades, young people in the United States got fatter and fatter -- ate more, sat more -- and nobody seemed to notice. Not parents or schools, not medical groups or the government.
But since the alarm was finally sounded in the late 1990s, the problem has been the country's reaction: a fragmented, inchoate response that critics say has suffered particularly from inadequate direction and dollars at the federal level.

In D.C., where kids live sets tone for weight loss success - Tuesday, May 20

The lede:

Latrisha Avery knows losing weight could head off the diabetes that runs in her family. But the fifth-grader has a more immediate reason for her goal of losing 20 pounds before she starts middle school next year: So kids will stop calling her "King Kong."

TK: The inherent "conflict of interest" at USDA is noted in the "inertia" article. From the story:

The USDA plays a central and often inconsistent role on the issue. It is the department behind the pyramid that shows Americans how fruits and vegetables should be consumed more than fatty foods, yet it supports companies' development of products that flout those guidelines. Pizza Hut's stuffed-crust pizza is among critics' ready examples. "The conflict of interest is inherent in the USDA," said Kelly Brownell, professor of psychology at Yale University and co-founder of the Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity. "Their main task is to promote agriculture and food, and their secondary task is to establish nutrition policy."