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It was 2013 and I was road tripping out in the American south west. I was lucky enough to get a car with Sirius satellite radio which meant even in the most remote locales of the country I was able to listen to pretty much whatever I wanted. So there I was, in Canyonlands National Park, far far away from the only civilization in Moab, when a hilarious comedian by the name of Amy Schumer came on the air. She was funny. She was hilarious. She made my trip all that much enjoyable. And I took a note in my...

For this year’s Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue, beauty isn’t measured by pounds or kilograms; it’s defined by Ashley Graham. The model just made history, becoming the first-ever size-16 body activist model to grace the cover of the magazine. And she almost started her celebration with a wardrobe malfunction.

Good news for some in the high-BMI crowd: A new study from UCLA finds that some 54 million Americans who are labeled as obese or overweight according to their body mass index are, when you take a closer look, actually healthy. The findings, published in the International Journal of Obesity, reveal that employers could potentially saddle people with unfairly high health insurance costs based on a deeply flawed measure of actual health. ... Body mass index is calculated by dividing a person's weight in kilograms by the square of the person's height in meters. According to the Centers for Disease...

The use of Body Mass Index to assess a person's health has led to millions of people incorrectly being labeled overweight or obese, researchers claim. The measurement has been used by doctors for more than 150 years, but has come under increasing criticism for being a flawed marker of health. [...] Now, however, Californian researchers claim their research will be will be 'the final nail in the coffin for BMI'. [...] This revealed almost half of Americans who are labeled 'overweight' by virtue of their BMIs (47.4 percent, or 34.4 million people) are healthy, as are 19.8 million who are...

California has given us three new truths about government. One, the higher that taxes rise, the worst state services become. Two, the worse a natural disaster hits, the more the state contributes to its havoc. And three, the more existential the problem, the more the state ignores it. California somehow has managed to have the fourth-highest gas taxes in the nation, yet its roads are rated 44th among the 50 states. Nearly 70 percent of California roads are considered to be in poor or mediocre condition by the state Senate. In response, the state Legislature naturally wants to raise gas...

Having solved all other problems plaguing our society, New York Times opinion author (and food journalist) Mark Bittman has his eye on the big prize. Taking a page from Michael Bloomberg’s big government playbook, Mark is looking for a new way stop people from drinking soda. Since efforts to ban sales of any sort fell flat in the courts (pun intended) the author is looking for more of a generational change, and the way to do that is to stop kids from getting in the habit of drinking the sugary beverages at an early age. How do we do that?...

Food hunger in America: More Hype than Reality. Why?He that speaketh truth sheweth forth righteousness: but a false witness deceit. (Proverbs 12:17)We see often such claims in the media such as that "millions in people here in American could be staring at an empty plate," "49 million people [approx. 1 out of 6 in American]...face hunger," "millions of Americans go to bed hungry," "1 in 7 people struggles with hunger in the US," (Feeding America) or "1 in 6 people in America faces hunger every day," (https://www.dosomething.org) or "50 million Americans—including 1 out of every 4 children—do not know where...

Obesity is a National Security Issue: Lieutenant General Mark Hertling at TEDxMidAtlantic 2012 Lieutenant General Mark Phillip Hertling, is the Commanding General, US Army Europe and Seventh Army. In that role, he is the commander of the approximately 42,000 U.S. Army forces assigned to Europe, and he is the Army Component Commander of U.S. European Command. While Hertling's primary role is training U.S. Army soldiers and units for Contingency and Full Spectrum Operations, he is also responsible for Theater Security Cooperation and Building Partner Capacity with the 51 allied nations that are part of the European area of operation.

David Diamond, Ph.D., of the University of South Florida College of Arts and Sciences shares his personal story about his battle with obesity. Diamond shows how he lost weight and reduced his triglycerides by eating red meat, eggs and butter. You can download Dr. Diamond's PowerPoint and the iTunes U podcast here: http://www.cas.usf.edu/news/s/169/#VI...

Obesity is still rising among American adults, despite more than a decade of public-awareness campaigns and other efforts to get people to watch their weight, and women have now overtaken men in the obese category, new government research shows. For the past several years, experts thought the nation's alarming, decades-long rise in obesity had leveled off. But the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in a report Thursday that the obesity rate has climbed to nearly 38 percent of adults, up from 32 percent about a decade earlier.

Gary Taubes, a nationally known science writer, gives a lecture about obesity. The event was held at New Brighton School and was sponsored by the Santa Cruz County Office of Education.

Despite their bad reputation, junk food, fast food and soda aren't the root cause of America's obesity epidemic, Cornell University researchers contend. While these sugary and salt-laden foods may not be good for your health, the scientists found no significant difference in how much of these foods either overweight or normal weight people consumed. The real problem, according to the researchers: too many Americans eat too much. "These are foods that are clearly bad for you and if you eat too much of them they will make you fat, but it doesn't appear to be the main driver that is...

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) has spent over $1.1 million studying the “freshman 15,” trying to determine whether friends influence their college peers to eat more.Sen. Rand Paul (R., Ky.) highlighted the project as an example of wasteful spending, calling out the agency for studying a myth invented by Seventeen magazine.“The ‘freshman 15’ is an old legend around college campuses; the idea that new college students, away from home and confronted with a campus food service smorgasbord tend to put on a few extra pounds,” Paul’s latest edition of “The Waste Report” reads. “Well the National Institutes for Health...

The United States is home to the most obese population in the Americas, Asia and Europe, has the fattest kids by a wide margin and is tops in poor health for teenagers, according to the latest measure of well-being from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. In its "How's Life 2015?" report released Tuesday, the United States is also among the nations with underperforming students and second in murders and assaults. But the U.S. shines when it comes to personal wealth and even the number of rooms in our homes, said the organization that charts the personal and economic...

Cajun Chef's death announced

A man who tips the scale at close to 800 pounds says he has nowhere to go after being kicked out of a hospital weight loss program for ordering pizza. Now he rides in the back of an SUV while his father drives the roads of Rhode Island, looking for someone who can help. Steven Assanti, 33, said his eating addiction has led him to this place, living in the back of his dad's SUV with nowhere else to go. For the past 80 days, Assanti was getting the help he needed in a Rhode Island hospital where he lost 20 pounds. But...

THURSDAY, July 16, 2015 (HealthDay News) -- One-third of young adults in the United States are too overweight to be in the military, according to a report from a group of retired military leaders.

WHAT COMMON PRACTICE WILL HORRIFY OUR KIDS SOMEDAY?It puts babies' overall nutrition at risk Question Everything IconMany families are trying to reduce their soda intake but manufacturers are fighting back with “no added sugar” formulations and “fruit” drinks. So far, they’re winning. A drink of diluted fruit juice is the routine afternoon snack of many babies. It’s often the good stuff: pure juice. No nasty preservatives, more vitamin C than necessary and no added sugar. But you don’t have to add sugar to make fruit juice sweet—that’s why babies prefer it to water. And because they prefer it, it becomes...

The trendy nutritional advice that's more likely to make you ill than healthy The supermarket aisle has become a confusing place. It used to be full of recognisable items like cheese and butter; now you find yourself bamboozled by all manner of odd alternatives such as ‘raw’ hummus, wheat-free bread and murky juices. You have to stay pretty alert to make sure you pick up a pint of proper milk, rather than a soy-based alternative or one free from lactose. Supermarkets have become shrines to ‘clean eating’, a faith that promises happiness, healthiness and energy. Food is to be worshipped...

The woman, 70, was hoisted in a large yellow net by FDNY paramedics from her Fifth Avenue home and rushed to St. Luke’s Hospital, where she was listed in stable condition. “Firemen came down and measured the elevator door,” the building doorman said. “She would not have been able to get out of the door.”