Since 1980, childhood obesity rates have more than tripled in the United States. Recent data show that almost one-third of children over 2 years of age are already overweight or obese. While the prevalence of childhood obesity appears to have plateaued in recent years, the magnitude of the problem remains unsustainably high and represents an enormous public health concern. All options for addressing the childhood obesity epidemic must therefore be explored. In the United States, legal approaches have successfully reduced other threats to public health, such as the lack of passive restraints in automobiles and the use of tobacco. The question then arises of whether laws, regulations, and litigation can likewise be used to change practices and policies that contribute to obesity. On October 21, 2010, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) held a workshop to bring together stakeholders to discuss the current and future legal strategies aimed at combating childhood obesity. Legal Strategies in Childhood Obesity Prevention summarizes the proceedings of that workshop. The report examines the challenges involved in implementing public health initiatives by using legal strategies to elicit change. It also discusses circumstances in which legal strategies are needed and effective. This workshop was created only to explore the boundaries of potential legal approaches to address childhood obesity, and therefore, does not contain recommendations for the use of such approaches.

Obesity has reached epidemic proportions in countries like the United States. This book provides a comprehensive summary of obesity in America and around the world, discussing the causes and proposing ways to help stem the tide and to help those who are overweight. A highly useful and accessible resource for high school to undergraduate students as well as post-graduate level readers with an interest in health and nutrition, this updated second edition of Obesity: A Reference Handbook offers up-to-date answers to essential questions about obesity and connected societal and health care-related issues. A single-volume, go-to resource, this book addresses difficult questions such as whether obesity is a disease or a moral failing; what factors contribute to obesity; what the economic impacts of obesity are on the health care industry; if and how poverty is a contributor to obesity; how our society encourages obesity; and how changes can be made to improve our society's eating habits as a whole. It presents citations from individuals and peer-reviewed journals and review articles, providing a balance of information sourced from both professionals and informed lay commentators. Also included are dozens of biographies of individuals who have been important in studying, preventing, managing, or increasing awareness about obesity, such as Jared Fogle, longtime Subway sandwiches spokesperson; Kelly Brownell, who coined the phrase "toxic environment" to describe unhealthy food and exercise patterns; researcher Ethan Allen Sims, who examined the relationship between obesity and diabetes; and Oprah Winfrey, well-known celebrity who stated that if there were a pill to lose weight or a magic diet, she would have it.

"When was the last time you felt this comfortable in a relationship?" -- An ad for sneakers "You can love it without getting your heart broken." -- An ad for a car "Until I find a real man, I'll settle for a real smoke." -- A woman in a cigarette ad Many advertisements these days make us feel as if we have an intimate, even passionate relationship with a product. But as Jean Kilbourne points out in this fascinating and shocking exposé, the dreamlike promise of advertising always leaves us hungry for more. We can never be satisfied, because the products we love cannot love us back. Drawing upon her knowledge of psychology, media, and women's issues, Kilbourne offers nothing less than a new understanding of a ubiquitous phenomenon in our culture. The average American is exposed to over 3,000 advertisements a day and watches three years' worth of television ads over the course of a lifetime. Kilbourne paints a gripping portrait of how this barrage of advertising drastically affects young people, especially girls, by offering false promises of rebellion, connection, and control. She also offers a surprising analysis of the way advertising creates and then feeds an addictive mentality that often continues throughout adulthood.

Rev. ed. of: Obesity prevention and public health / edited by David Crawford and Robert W. Jeffery. 2005.

Can corporate marketing foster sustainable consumption? Is there a strong business case? What are the key factors for successful marketing strategies and communication campaigns in that field? In answering these questions this book provides: a summary of existing research on consumers' attitudes towards green products; analysis of various marketing strategies and campaigns from pioneers companies and mainstream groups in sectors like clothing, cosmetics, food retail, and automotive; tips to communicate effectively and a practical toolbox for practitioners. This publication has been produced by UNEP, the Global Compact Office and Utopies (a French consultancy firm specialized in sustainable development strategies).

The Nation's Health, Eighth Edition provides students with a comprehensive examination of the health of the U.S. population and the complex factors that contribute to it. --

Collected in this volume are the best articles and symposia from Poverty & Race, the bimonthly newsletter journal of The Poverty & Race Research Action Council (PRRAC), a Washington, DC-based national public interest organization founded in 1990. Poverty & Race in America includes over six-dozen works originally published between mid-2001 and 2005, many of which have been updated and revised. The contributors represent the best of progressive thought and activism on America's two most salient, and seemingly intractable, domestic problems-race and poverty. Divided into topical sections, this volume considers the issues of race, poverty, housing, education, health, and democracy. Poverty & Race in America is especially concerned with the links between and among these areas, both for purposes of analysis and policy prescriptions. Featuring a foreword by Congressman Jesse L. Jackson, Jr., this edited collection will be of great interest to policy makers and human rights activists and hopefully stimulate creative thought and action to bring an end to racism and poverty.

The Savage Side critiques the primary models of deity in dominant political theologies, especially those which align God with the natural world. The justice-seeking, political revolutionary God that the oppressed worship has dwindled back to the political fervor from which it sprang. In its place, a God based on our struggling existence in the natural world emerges, terrifyingly indifferent to any political or moral ideology.