Apr

29

(Childhood Obesity News) Of Epidemics And "Epidemics" - Huffington Post

Filed Under Childhood Obesity News | Leave a Comment

The current swine flu epidemic, with all of its gravitas , actually almost makes light of another “epidemic” that has afflicted millions in the United States for years and which shows no sign of subsiding; namely, childhood obesity. If this is the case, then it allows those responsible for their own child’s obesity to believe that the problem is out of their hands — as if it were the product of some plague or natural disaster rather than just years of neglectful parenting. And many will do just that anyways, by making a scapegoat of public schools or something uncontrollable such as genetic predispositions, even though for the latter, the meteoric rise in prevalence must mean that something external and environmental is factoring into the equation. The reason we’ve heard so much about this issue for so long — and why well argued, level-headed editorials such as the piece in the Times’ this week go unheeded — is because ad hoc instances of child obesity are not yet permissible targets for social condemnation. Read Childhood Obesity

Technorati Tags: , , , , , ,