MacRaven - Dave Haxton's Weblog

Sun, 07 Jan 2007

As Obesity Fight Hits Cafeteria, Many Fear a Note From School

Overlawyered recently pointed out an article in the Times Online that the British Medical Journal was offering this prescription for obesity:

Printing a helpline numbers for advice with all clothes sold with a waist of more than 40in for men and 37in for boys, women’s garments with a waist of more than 35in or size 16 or above, and more than 31in for girls

Banning the placement of sweets and fatty snacks at or near shop tills and at children’s eye level

Taxing processed foods that are high in sugar or saturated fat

Introducing health checks for all school leavers, both primary and secondary

Allowing new urban roads only if they have cycle lanes

Establishing a dedicated central agency responsible for all aspects of obesity

How long before students with an "unacceptable" BMI are refused graduation?

Several states have begun sending students’ Body Mass Index scores home to parents, turning the reports into a new rite of childhood.

(link) [New York Times]

/Politics | 3 writebacks | permanent link

On 1/8/2007 08:08:27
Bernulf wrote

Compare this to what's already being done to smokers, and I'd actually suggest it's an improvement. Granted, there are some really silly recommendations here...but I think adding cycling lanes to new roads is an *excellent* idea. I also think moving the candy away from check-out lanes is a good idea: in retail, those things are referred to as 'impulse items', they want you to get those things on impulse, that they are there is taking advantage of marketing psychology and it's stacking the deck against a customer (especially if you have to wait in a long line, the Skittles just get more and more inviting). I think the removal of snacks from impulse item areas is a first step, though...in America in particular, and now here in Germany (due in large part to American restaurant chains), people are slammed with marketing enticements to over-size meal portions. What used to be considered a decent calorie count for an entire day gets served up in a single meal (for just a buck more). If there's going to be a centralized agency for obesity, I would hope that it had the power and authority to wedge itself between bombardments of marketing and the people who've been getting exposed to it from childhood on.

On 1/8/2007 08:42:53
Arwin wrote

I love the idea

for bicycle lanes with any new urban road.... but then again as a cyclist I have a definite bias toward spending tax dollars for these lanes. Just as Dave has a bias toward smoking and natural foods in this blog. Hey it is his blog after all.

On 1/8/2007 19:03:44
SB wrote

I like the bicycle lanes idea too, but I'd add that every new road has to have a sidewalk along it as well. I've lived too many places where it wasn't safe to walk because you'd have to do so in the road or in a drainage ditch. BMI doesn't belong on a report card any more than things like hair color or eye color. Grading people for their bodies is a sick, sick activity. The school has no vested interest in whether or not the children attending it are fat, active, or even healthy. The school's only concern should be education and the safety of the children while they are in attendance. Any parent who recieves a report card with a "BMI score" on it should immediately write to the school telling them to mind their own business, or face a lawsuit. Meanwhile, the schools could do a better job promoting the idea that just because your classmates are different than you doesn't mean you have a right to treat them as less than human. Perhaps if they diverted all the energy from this hand wringing over private body issues into tolerance education, they might notice that being fat isn't the end of the world. But if they are so determined to butt in where they don't belong, they could do a better job focusing on what students aren't eating, these being the years when many children develop eating disorders. And yes, that means if you see a fat student skipping lunch, it's not a opportunity to praise that student for self control but a warning sign for an eating disorder.

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