The “fat gene” accounts for less than 1 percent of the differences in size between people. To date, about a hundred genetic markers have been linked to obesity, but when you put them all together, overall, they account for less than 3 percent of the difference in body mass index...
Rather than being some kind of disorder or a failure of willpower, weight gain is largely a normal response by normal people to an abnormal situation. It’s been said that “Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution.” The known genetic contribution to obesity may be small,...
We have an uncanny ability to pick out the subtle distinctions in calorie density of foods, but only within the natural range. The traditional medical view on obesity, as summed up nearly a century ago: “All obese persons are, alike in one fundamental respect,—they literally overeat.” While this may be...
The rise in the U.S. calorie supply responsible for the obesity epidemic wasn’t just about more food, but a different kind of food. The rise in the number of calories provided by the food supply since the 1970s “is more than sufficient to explain the US epidemic of obesity.” Similar...
Leafly Nation, did you know weed can smell and taste like coconuts? If you’ve just fallen out of a tree and are coming up to speed on the latest in cannabis—come along with us. Here’s a tour of the best coconut weed strains and products perfuming the zeitgeist.Trending ‘coconut’ strains 🥥Coconut...
Floridians get to free the weed at the ballot box Nov. 5. What’s at stake? Scores of weed arrests, and at least $200 million per year in tax revenue for a massive, newly-legal economy. Also, tens of millions of dollars more in criminal justice savings from fewer arrests and prison sentences. That...
Why are U.S. taxpayers giving billions of dollars to support the likes of the sugar and meat industries? The rise in calorie surplus sufficient to explain the obesity epidemic was less a change in food quantity than in food quality. Access to cheap, high-calorie, low-quality convenience foods exploded, and the...
The unprecedented rise in the power, scope, and sophistication of food marketing starting around 1980 aligns well with the blastoff slope of the obesity epidemic. In the 1970s, the U.S. government went from just subsidizing some of the worst foods to paying companies to make more of them: “Congress passed...
We all like to think we make important life decisions, like what to eat, consciously and rationally, but if that were the case, we wouldn’t be in the midst of an obesity epidemic. The opening words of the Institute of Medicine’s report on the potential threat posed by food ads...
The power of the “eat more” food environment can overcome our conscious controls. Food and beverage companies frame body weight as “a matter of personal choice.” Even when we aren’t distracted, the power of the “eat more” food environment may sometimes overcome our conscious controls of overeating. One look around...
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