I definitely agree - obesity reflects the food environment.

I wish I had written this piece!

Jacob Shelley presents the case for simplifying health policy by framing obesity as an accidental risk from a calorie-heavy food environment. Children learn to eat too much for their energy needs from parents and others who encourage over-consumption. Since when have you seen parents encouraging toddlers to move more?

www.biomedcentral.com/content/pdf/1471-2458-12-1042.pdf

And apparently, parents aren't very realistic about their toddlers' size anyway...

http://pcmlifestyle.com/2012/05/is-your-toddler-overweight-study-says-most-moms-cant-tell/
[Image credit: from the linked article "Is you toddler overweight?"]

Don't mess with my insides, OK?

Flexocrats: The Donut Is Not The Problem, It's Us

It's all very well to say we have to live in the same food-abundant and exercise-deficient environment no matter what happens in Westernised economies, but I don't want you messing with my insides! Having distrusted aspartame and Xenical for their "interference" with bodily "expectations" of nutrition and thus metabolism, I don't want to see scientists invent something that will artificially speed up my metabolism and do untold harm to another aspect of it! What if they discovered something that worked fine for about five years and then started to turn your liver cells into cancer because their functions had been subverted?

I still say we have to establish old-fashioned habits in childhood and make the environment fit the human body, not the other way round. Farmers could even get better prices for their produce if it wasn't put through all the artificial processes we impose on food so we can put it in plastic and make it last forever!

Teaching the public the truth about food and obesity

Brief 4: Public engagement with science - NeuroFAST, NeuroFAST

This account of a presentation about food, addiction and obesity is so good it makes me want to get something like this started in Australia. I thnk it would be worthwhile for the government Preventive health Taskforce or a sponsored NGO to tour the whole country. The style of presentation and inclusion of the audience in the nitty gritty of debate seems as good as any I've heard.

Let's give it a go!

LGBT support group sign removed at Festival by Lord Mayor!

Twenty10 - a place to be you

I believe that discrimination against support groups for LGBT citizens is a Public Health issue and that we need action on the following:


I complained about the behaviour of the Lord Mayor of Parramatta in ordering the removal of a sign promoting support services for gay, lesbian & transgender citizens and youth at the Rediscover the River Festival on 17th January 2013.

The sign from the Twenty10 Organisation was not offensive in the eyes of the vast majority of people who saw it, on report of local individuals (not me, but relatives in Parramatta). My attention was drawn to the matter by my trans-gender cousin (F to M), on Facebook, where a good deal of anger has been generated.

Banning this sign is not in agreement with national or state government policies and I doubt it is  congruent with their own council policies. I noted that the words "gay", "lesbian" and "homosexual" do not appear on the entire council website, although they do include a sexual health clinic in their community services links: 
Parramatta Sexual Health Clinic Phone: 02 9843 3124 Fax: 02 9893 7103 Jeffery House, Level 1, 162 Marsden St, Parramatta 2150 

The council states in their "Year in Review" publication that they are against discrimination, inlcuding that against new and emerging groups:


Some of Council’s services, such as running libraries and 
childcare centres and collecting waste and recycling, 
are easy to see. Behind the scenes, Council continues to 
look after members of the community who are less able 
to look after themselves because of age, disability or 
discrimination, including new and emerging communities. 
We lobby other tiers of government on key issues like 
transport and housing. 

NSW state law says it is against the law to vilify or discriminate against people who are homosexual nor their relatives; not even against people you think are in a sexuality-associated social group. Is somebody going to report this highly influential Lord Mayor? Come on somebody!

The Australian Government in line with the Human Rights Commission also has anti-discrimination laws that can be enforced in situations resembling the Parramatta case.