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This practical guide helps health or social care professionals across all settings to understand how important it is to prevent and manage their service users'overweight and obesity, and motivate them to achieve and maintain a healthy weight, so reducing their risk of associated health conditions such as diabetes and now COVID-19. Obesity and associated health problems represent a growing health burden around the world, with rates throughout Europe increasing sharply over the last forty years, second only to the United States and closely followed by many nations in Asia.The book will be an invaluable manual for general practice, primary care and community clinicians, practice and community nurses and dietitians and a go-to reference for health professionals across all medical specialties and related support services, as well as medical education, public health and social care worker professionals.

Draws on the growing field of obesity research; including causes, related conditions, preventions and treatment.

How stigma derails well-intentioned public health efforts, creating suffering and worsening inequalities.2020 Winner, Society for Anthropological Sciences Carol R. Ember Book Prize,Shortlisted for the British Sociological Association's Foundation for the Sociology of Health and Illness Book PrizeStigma is a dehumanizing process, where shaming and blaming are embedded in our beliefs about who does and does not have value within society. In Lazy, Crazy, and Disgusting, medical anthropologists Alexandra Brewis and Amber Wutich explore a darker side of public health: that well-intentioned public health campaigns can create new and damaging stigma, even when they are otherwise successful. Brewis and Wutich present a novel, synthetic argument about how stigmas act as a massive driver of global disease and suffering, killing or sickening billions every year. They focus on three of the most complex, difficult-to-fix global health efforts: bringing sanitation to all, treating mental illness, and preventing obesity. They explain how and why humans so readily stigmatize, how this derails ongoing public health efforts, and why this process invariably hurts people who are already at risk. They also explore how new stigmas enter global health so easily and consider why destigmatization is so very difficult. Finally, the book offers potential solutions that may be able to prevent, challenge, and fix stigma. Stigma elimination, Brewis and Wutich conclude, must be recognized as a necessary and core component of all global health efforts.Drawing on the authors'keen observations and decades of fieldwork, Lazy, Crazy, and Disgusting combines a wide array of ethnographic evidence from around the globe to demonstrate conclusively how stigma undermines global health's basic goals to create both health and justice.

Most people try out diets just to see if they work. One friend cuts out sugar, a second cuts out fat. Another mumbles something about gut microbes. Even scientists still seem to be arguing about what causes obesity, so what hope is there for the rest of us? Anthony Warner, author of The Angry Chef, has decided to get to the bottom of it once and for all. Is obesity really an epidemic? Can you be addicted to food? Can't you just exercise your way to freedom? And what the heck is a food desert? You want the truth? The science, without the prejudice? You can handle it.

This book sheds new light on the political battle to define and construct obesity as a policy issue. Through a rich analysis of the debates in Australia and the UK, it develops a nuanced analysis of the competing narratives that actors rely on to make sense of and argue about this issue, and documents how and to what effect they draw on scientific evidence to support their accounts. The real'war on obesity', it demonstrates, has always been over the meaning and nature of this public health crisis. This insightful work will interest scholars of interpretive policy studies, critical public health and science and technology studies.

The current'obesity epidemic'has been at the top of the national and, increasingly, global public agenda for the last decade, the subject of extensive and intensive concern, scrutiny, and corrective efforts from various quarters. In the United States, much of this attention is predicated on the'official'discourse, or story, of obesity-that it is a matter of personal responsibility, specifically to the end of monitoring and ensuring appropriate caloric balance. However, even though it continues to have cultural presumption, that discourse does not resonate with the populace, which may explain why efforts of redress have been notoriously ineffective. In this book, Helene Shugart places obesity in cultural, political, and economic context, arguing that current anxieties regarding obesity reflect the contemporary crisis in neoliberalism, and that the failure of the official discourse of obesity mirrors the failure of neoliberalism more broadly: specifically, to account for authenticity, a powerfully resonant cultural concept today. She chronicles a number of competing discourses of obesity that have arisen in response to the failed official discourse, examining and evaluating each in relation to the idea of authenticity; assessing the practical and behavioral implications of each discourse for both obesity incidence and redress; and establishing the significance of each discourse for negotiating neoliberalism in crisis more broadly.

Obesity continues to be a major problem for global public health, affecting not only adults, but increasingly also adolescents and even young children. Moreover, obesity and diabetes are no longer limited to wealthy societies: rates are also rising in low- and middle-income countries. Summarizing some of the key issues in obesity treatment and prevention, this publication promotes novel and interdisciplinary approaches and explores cutting-edge ideas that span child development, nutrition, behavioral sciences, economics, geography and public health. Contributions suggest a sequence of steps that may result in new ways to address obesity at the personal as well as at the population level: First, a clear understanding of who becomes obese, where, and for what reason is needed. Second, the likely contributions to overeating by the brain, biology, economics and the environment need to be identified. Then, based on the understanding of disease etiology and its distribution by geography and by social strata, targeted yet comprehensive strategies for obesity prevention and treatment for both individuals and groups need to be developed.

What I had in mind when I started planning this book was a collection of scholarly essays, each dealing with the problem of obsesity from a particular point of view, which I hoped would be of value to all those working in the field, either as researchers or as therapists. I approached my task in the spirit of an art collector. Such a person must soon recognise that he or she can never, unless possessed of quite extraordinary powers, (and I certainly am not), gather unto himself all the known examples of the works he wishes to collect. Rather he must select, picking out those items which he believes to be most important in the area he is covering. That is what I have tried to do in this book. As with an art collection, an editor of a series of essays must select both for content and for author. I realise that any such selection is bound to be some­ what arbitrary, but I have tried to include those topics related to obesity which I consider to be, not only the most relevant, but also those in which the most significant theoretical and practical advances are currently being made. The first four of the seven contributions included in the book are concerned with pathogenesis, and the remaining three with management. The first chapter, by Dr. John Garrow, is an overall review of the metabolic influences on body weight as a whole.

Although drinking, smoking and obesity have attracted social and moral condemnation to varying degrees for more than two hundred years, over the past few decades they have come under intense attack from the field of public health as an'unholy trinity'of lifestyle behaviours with apparently devastating medical, social and economic consequences. Indeed, we appear to be in the midst of an important historical moment in which policies and practices that would have been unthinkable a decade ago (e.g., outdoor smoking bans, incarcerating pregnant women for drinking alcohol, and prohibiting restaurants from serving food to fat people), have become acceptable responses to the'risks'that alcohol, tobacco and obesity are perceived to pose. Hailing from Canada, Australia, the United Kingdom and the USA, and drawing on examples from all four countries, contributors interrogate the ways in which alcohol, tobacco and fat have come to be constructed as'problems'requiring intervention and expose the social, cultural and political roots of the current public health obsession with lifestyle. No prior collection has set out to provide an in-depth examination of alcohol, tobacco and obesity through the comparative approach taken in this volume. This book therefore represents an invaluable and timely contribution to critical studies of public health, health inequities, health policy, and the sociology of risk more broadly.

In a world now filled with more people who are overweight than underweight, public health and medical perspectives paint obesity as a catastrophic epidemic that threatens to overwhelm health systems and undermine life expectancies globally. In many societies, being obese also creates profound personal suffering because it is so culturally stigmatized. Yet despite loud messages about the health and social costs of being obese, weight gain is a seemingly universal aspect of the modern human condition. Grounded in a holistic anthropological approach and using a range of ethnographic and ecological case studies, Obesity shows that the human tendency to become and stay fat makes perfect sense in terms of evolved human inclinations and the physical and social realities of modern life. Drawing on her own fieldwork in the rural United States, Mexico, and the Pacific Islands over the last two decades, Alexandra A. Brewis addresses such critical questions as why obesity is defined as a problem and why some groups are so much more at risk than others. She suggests innovative ways that anthropology and other social sciences can use community-based research to address the serious public health and social justice concerns provoked by the global spread of obesity.

Obesity is one of the most pressing health issues affecting our country. This unique volume is the first to apply behavioral economicsóthe integration of psychological and economic knowledgeóto the study of eating behavior. The text demonstrates how this discipline can be used to understand why it so difficult for individuals to control their eating habits, and helps readers use this knowledge to create and improve public health nutrition programs and policies. The text examines dietary choices and obesity through a multidisciplinary lens of biological, psychological, and social factors, and draws from the disciplines of behavioral economics, nutrition, public health, and health promotion. Based on the premise that humans are hardwired to make judgment errors and need a ìnudgeî to make decisions in their best interests, the book argues that increasing consumer well-being requires changing an individualís personal environment. It describes the power of irrational forces that compete with sensible judgment in regard to food choices, and provides strategies for improving decisions and health habits. Highly accessible, the text will be of interest to students, professors, and practitioners in nutrition-related health programs, as well as to public health policy makers.Key Features: Assesses the social determinants that affect nutrition choices, including food availability, nutrition education, income, culture, and other key factorsDemonstrates how flawed decisions and self-control difficulties can affect eating behaviorProvides a valuable framework for improving public health through understanding and changing the way individuals make food decisionsExplains the link between obesity rates and economics of food choice (fast food, food marketing, and social factors)Provides strategies and tools to help people improve their decision-making and health habits

In the historical record there is abundant evidence that obesity was a medical and health concern as long as medicine has been practiced. The idea of diet and exercise are bulwarks in the fight against obesity in history from the time of Hippocrates to the 16th century-a span of 2,000 years. Examining the history and etiology of the obesity epidemic, this book discusses various requirements of effective intervention and treatment strategies. The first section covers the history of obesity, defines and evaluates the clinical presentation of the pathology, discusses its prevalence in the population, and explains common analytical measurements. Chapters include genetics and genetic factors, modern consequences of obesity, and quality of life issues. The second section introduces prevention strategies in children and adults, such as dietary and lifestyle changes, medication, and surgical interventions.

Suitable for practicing pharmacists, this book helps in understanding, management and treatment of Obesity. It focuses on the prevention of obesity including prevention on government level, psychological intervention and exercise and nutrition.

Today's children may well become the first generation of Americans whose life expectancy will be shorter than that of their parents. The culprit, public health experts agree, is obesity and its associated health problems. Heretofore, the strategy to slow obesity's galloping pace has been driven by what the philosopher Karl Popper calls ‘‘the bucket theory of the mind.''When minds are seen as containers and public understanding is viewed as being a function of how many scientific facts are known, the focus is naturally on how many scientific facts public minds contain. But the strategy has not worked. Despite all the diet books, the wide availability of reduced-calorie and reduced-fat foods, and the broad publicity about the obesity problem, America's waistline continues to expand. It will take more than food pyramid images or a new nutritional guideline to stem obesity's escalation. Albert Einstein once observed that the significant problems we face cannot be solved at the same level of thinking we were at when we created them, and that we would have to shift to a new level, a deeper level of thinking,tosolvethem. Thisbookarguesfor,andpresents,adifferent perspective for thinking about and addressing the obesity problem: a systems thinking perspective. While already commonplace in engineering and in business, the use of systems thinking in personal health is less widely adopted. Yet this is precisely the setting where complexities are most problematicandwherethestakesarehighest.

Nutrition and Metabolism: Underlying Mechanisms and Clinical Consequences brings together internationally recognized experts to comprehensively review our current understanding of how nutrition interacts with the genetic substrate as well as environmental-exogenous factors, including physical activity or the lack thereof, to result in insulin resistance and the metabolic syndrome. After presenting the scope of the problem, the first major part of the book is devoted to genetics and pathophysiology, the second part of the book presents the public health perspective of the most prevalent problems associated with nutrition and the metabolic syndrome, whereas the third major part of the book focuses on clinical assessment and management of the main disease states associated with inappropriate nutrition and the metabolic syndrome. Finally, general information useful for both clinicians and researchers alike is presented in the Appendix. Nutrition and Metabolism: Underlying Mechanisms and Clinical Consequences offers the reader an up-to-date and authoritative review of the major scientific and clinical aspects of the overlapping areas between nutrition and metabolism.

Investigating the current interest in obesity and fatness, this book explores the problems and ambiguities that form the lived experience of'fat'women in contemporary Western society. Engaging with dominant ideas about'fatness', and analysing the assumptions that inform anti-fat attitudes in the West, The'Fat'Female Body explores the moral panic over the'obesity epidemic', and the intersection of medicine and morality in pathologising'fat'bodies. It contributes to the emerging field of fat studiesby offering not only alternative understandings of subjectivity, the (re)production of public knowledge(s) of'fatness', and politics of embodiment, but also the possibility of (re)reading'fat'bodies to foster more productive social relations.

Comprehensive in scope and meticulously researched, Handbook of Obesity Prevention analyzes the intricate causes of this public health crisis, and sets out concrete, multilevel strategies for meeting it head-on. This innovative handbook starts by clearly defining obesity in clinical, epidemiologic, and financial terms. From there, expert contributors provide insights on current issues, methods, and controversies in the field, focusing on new opportunities for prevention, successful interventions and initiatives, and guidelines for planning and implementing programs and evaluating results. This systematic approach to large-scale social and policy change gives all parties involved - from individual practitioners to multinational corporations - the tools to set and attain realistic goals based on solid evidence and best practice in public health.

Focusing on prevention rather than treatment, Obesity: Dietary and Developmental Influences reviews and evaluates the determinants of obesity. The book uses evidence-based research as a basis to define foods and dietary behaviors that should be supported and encouraged as well as those that should be discouraged. This comprehensive review re

The nation faces a growing epidemic of childhood obesity that threatens the immediate health of our children and their prospects of growing up healthy into adulthood. During the past 30 years, obesity in the United States has more than doubled among young children aged 2-5 years and adolescents aged 12-19 years, and it has more than tripled among youth aged 6-11 years. Currently, more than 9 million children 6 years of age and older are considered to be obese. The sequelae of obesity among children and youth are also rapidly increasing, including an increased risk of type 2 diabetes, hypertension, metabolic syndrome, asthma, and social and psychological consequences including low self-esteem and depression.To develop a prevention-focused action plan to reduce the number of obese children and youth in the United States, the Institute of Medicine organized three regional symposia, and held its second regional symposium in Atlanta, Georgia on October 6-7, 2005.Progress in Preventing Childhood Obesity: Focus on Communitieshighlights the recurring themes that emerged from the symposium for accelerating change and moving forward with obesity prevention efforts: empower communities and neighborhoods, change the environment, forge strategic partnerships, garner and mobilize political support, educate stakeholders, identify leaders and build on cultural assets, collect and disseminate local data, evaluate programs and interventions, and translate successful interventions to other communities. Approximately 90 individuals active in childhood obesity prevention efforts in the southeastern region of the United States who represented a range of stake holder perspectives and innovative practices in local communities including students, community leaders, physicians, health educators, clergy, teachers, and state and federal government officials were invited to participate in the symposium. The contents of this summary reflect specific examples presented and discussed during the symposium, and unless otherwise noted, the general perspectives of the participants. This summary, along with two other symposia summaries, and a more detailed discussion of insights and regional examples, will be incorporated in the IOM committee's final report on progress in preventing childhood obesity that will be released in the fall of 2006.

Recent studies of vascular biology using molecular biology techniques have started to reveal a previously unsuspected complexity of the vascular responses to nutrients and physical activity, thus explaining at the molecular level how healthy lifestyles interact with human genes and how they affect phenotype expression, even in the case of unfavorable genes. These findings have serious implications especially in establishing a solid scientific background for preventive strategies: for the advancement of healthy nutrition, physical activity and life habits, a thorough understanding of how drug/diet/gene interactions can act and multiply the beneficial effects of exercise is necessary. This first part of these conference proceedings is of great interest to researchers, physicians, exercise physiologists, geneticists, nutritionists, dietitians, food scientists, policy makers in government, private industry and international organizations, and public health workers worldwide.

“An in-depth, well-researched, and thoughtful exploration of the ‘fat boom'in America.” —TheBoston Globe Low carb, high protein, raw foods... despite our seemingly endless obsession with fad diets, the startling truth is that six out of ten Americans are overweight or obese. In Fat Land, award-winning nutrition and health journalist Greg Critser examines the facts and societal factors behind the sensational headlines, taking on everything from supersize to Super Mario, high-fructose corn syrup to the high costs of physical education. With a sharp eye and even sharper tongue, Critser examines why pediatricians are now treating conditions rarely seen in children before; why type 2 diabetes is on the rise; the personal struggles of those with weight problems—especially among the poor—and how agribusiness has altered our waistlines. Praised by the New York Times as “absorbing” and by Newsday as “riveting,” this disarmingly funny, yet truly alarming, exposé stands as an important examination of one of the most pressing medical and social issues in the United States. “One scary book and a good companion to Eric Schlosser's Fast Food Nation.” —Seattle Post-Intelligencer

Obesity in childhood and adolescence has reached epidemic proportions in all industrialized countries around the world. Its impact on individual lives as well as on health economics has to be recognized by physicians and the public alike. Among the most common consequences of obesity in the adolescent are hypertension, dyslipidemia, back pain and psychosocial problems. Therapeutic strategies include psychological and family therapy, lifestyle/behavior modification and nutrition education. The role of regular exercise and exercise programs is emphasized. Surgical procedures and drugs used in adult obesity are still not generally recommended for obese adolescents. This book aims to increase physicians´ knowledge and understanding of obesity in childhood and adolescence as well as to further public awareness of the health burden and economic dimension of obesity at a young age. Several chapters deliver insights into the basic understanding of which factors contribute to or prevent the development of overweight and obesity in young people. Other contributions provide tools for the clinician to manage the care of the child and adolescent with overweight/obesity. In addition, knowledge from the latest scientific studies on the molecular biology of obesity is also presented.

Overweight and obesity represent a rapidly growing threat to the health of populations in an increasing number of countries. Indeed they are now so common that they are replacing more traditional problems such as undernutrition and infectious diseases as the most significant causes of ill-health. Obesity comorbidities include coronary heart disease, hypertension and stroke, certain types of cancer, non-insulin-dependent diabetes, mellitus, gallbladder disease, dyslipidaemia, osteoarthritis and gout, and pulmonary diseases, including sleep apnoea. In addition, the obese suffer from social bias, prejudice and discrimination, on the part not only of the general public but also of health professionals, and this may make them reluctant to seek medical assistance. WHO therefore convened a Consultation on obesity to review current epidemiological information, contributing factors and associated consequences, and this report presents its conclusions and recommendations. In particular, the Consultation considered the system for classifying overweight and obesity based on the body mass index, and concluded that a coherent system is now available and should be adopted internationally.