Obesity’s genetic connection was conclusively demonstrated in the 1980s in a series of papers showing that body weight is strongly inherited, almost as strongly as height
Whenever I see a photo from the 1960s or 1970s, I am startled. It’s not the clothes. It’s not the hair. It’s the bodies. So many people were skinny.
In 1976, 15 percent of American adults were obese. Now the it’s nearly 40 per cent. Scientists do a lot of hand-waving about our “obesogenic environment” and point to favourite culprits: the abundance of cheap fast foods and snacks; food companies making products so tasty they are addictive; larger serving sizes; the tendency to graze all day.|Obesity
Everyone — from doctors to drug companies, from public health officials to overweight people themselves — would love to see a cure, a treatment that brings weight to normal and keeps it there. Why hasn’t anyone discovered one? It’s not for lack of trying. There is just one almost uniformly effective treatment, and it is woefully underused: only about 1 per cent of the 24 million American adults who are eligible get the procedure.
That treatment is bariatric surgery, a drastic operation that turns the stomach into a tiny pouch and, in one version, also reroutes the intestines. Their health usually improves anyway. Many with diabetes no longer need insulin. Cholesterol and blood pressure levels tend to fall. Sleep apnea disappears. Backs, hips and knees stop aching. There are not nearly enough surgeons or facilities to operate on all the obese people who might be helped by bariatric surgery, noted Randy Seeley, director of the nutrition research center at the University of Michigan.
