The battle of the bulge has been a big, fat failure for U.S. drugmakers. But that hasn’t stopped them from trying.

For nearly a century, scientists have struggled to make a diet pill that helps people lose weight without side effects that range from embarrassing digestive issues to dangerous heart problems.

Earlier this week, a government panel recommended the FDA approve the latest diet drug Qnexa. The recommendation raises hopes that the U.S. could approve the first anti-obesity drug in more than a decade. It also highlights how challenging it is to create a pill that fights fat in a variety of people without negative side effects. Even Qnexa was previously rejected over concerns that it can cause heart palpitations and birth defects if taken by pregnant women.

“Having a drug for obesity would be like telling me you had a drug for the fever,” said Dr. Mitchell Roslin, chief of bariatric surgery at Northern Westchester Hospital in New York. “There can be millions of different reasons why someone is obese; it’s really a symptom of various underlying mechanisms.”

Experts say deep, complex causes of obesity may be beyond reach of weight loss drugs – The Washington Post

The National Center for Public Policy Research hosted a “lunch-in” today at Freedom Plaza in Washington, D.C. The target of the protest? “[F]ederal school nutrition guidelines that allegedly forced at least one student to forgo her mother’s home-packed lunch in favor of chicken nuggets,” a press release announcing today’s event read.

‘Lunch-In’ Protests Crackdown on Homemade Lunches | The Weekly Standard

Everything you know about dieting is wrong, say US scientists who have devised a new formula for calculating calories and weight loss that they hope will revolutionize the way people tackle obesity.

Obesity rates have doubled worldwide in the past 30 years, coinciding with a growing food surplus, and the ensuing epidemic has sparked a multibillion dollar weight loss industry that has largely failed to curb the problem.

Current standards in the United States, where two thirds of people are overweight or obese, advise people that cutting calories by a certain amount will result in a slow and steady weight loss over time.

But that advice fails to account for how the body changes as it slims down, burning less energy and acquiring a slower metabolism, researchers told the American Association for the Advancement of Science meeting in Vancouver.

The result is a plateau effect that ends up discouraging dieters and sending them back into harmful patterns of overeating.

As an example, researcher Kevin Hall offered up his large vanilla latte, purchased at a popular coffee shop. When he asked, the barista told him it contained about 240 calories.

“The notion was if I drank one of these every day and then I replaced it with just black coffee no sugar, then over the course of a year I should lose about 25 pounds, and that should just keep going,” Hall told reporters.

“People have used this sort of rule of thumb to predict how much people should lose for decades now, and it turns out to be completely wrong.”

Hall, a scientist with the US National Institutes of Health, said his work aims to “come up with better rules and better predictions of what is going to happen when an individual changes their diet.”

Total rethink needed on dieting, scientists say – Yahoo! News

North Carolina officials have said there was a misunderstanding when a preschooler’s homemade lunch was sent home for not meeting certain nutritional requirements, but now a second mother from the same school has come forward exclusively to The Blaze to say the same thing happened to her daughter.

Diane Zambrano says her 4-year-old daughter, Jazlyn, is in the same West Hoke Elementary School class as the little girl whose lunch gained national attention earlier this week. When Zambrano picked Jazlyn up from school late last month, she was told by Jazlyn’s teacher that the lunch she had packed that day did not meet the necessary guidelines and that Jazlyn had been sent to the cafeteria.

The lunch Zambrano packed for her daughter? A cheese and salami sandwich on a wheat bun with apple juice. The lunch she got in the cafeteria? Chicken nuggets, a sweet potato, bread and milk.

North Carolina Mother Diane Zambrano Says Her Daughter‘s Homemade School Lunch Wasn’t Healthy Enough | West Hoke Elementary | TheBlaze.com

A North Carolina mom is irate after her four-year-old daughter returned home late last month with an uneaten lunch the mother had packed for the girl earlier that day. But she wasn’t mad because the daughter decided to go on a hunger strike. Instead, the reason the daughter didn‘t eat her lunch is because someone at the school determined the lunch wasn’t healthy enough and sent it back home.

Yes, you read that right.

The incident happened in Raeford, N.C. at West Hoke Elementary School. What was wrong with the lunch? That’s still a head-scratcher because it didn’t contain anything egregious: a turkey and cheese sandwich, banana, potato chips, and apple juice. But for the inspector on hand that day, it didn’t meet the healthy requirements.

See, in North Carolina, all pre-Kindergarten programs are required to evaluate the lunches being provided and determine if they meet USDA nutrition guidelines. If not, they must provide an alternative.

But that’s not the worst of it. Instead of being given a salad or something really healthy, the girl was given chicken nuggets instead. On top of it, her mother was then sent a bill for the cafeteria food.

North Carolina Girl’s Lunch Sent Home for Not Being Healthy Enough | TheBlaze.com

A 300-pound man was arrested after he was seen walking around an Exton, Pa., Walmart wearing nothing but socks. It was later discovered that the only apparel the man had on was stolen from the store, police say.Employees at Walmart called police at about 5:30 p.m. Wednesday, saying that there was a naked man walking around the store, authorities say.

When police arrived they found 32-year-old Verdon Lamont Taylor in the store wearing only socks, police say. When Taylor would not comply with officers, the 6-feet, 4-inch tall, 300-pound man was tasered and taken into custody. Taylor proceeded to spit in an officer’s face, police say.

Upon viewing surveillance video, police learned that Taylor walked into the store completely naked and walked straight to the customer service counter, stole a pair of socks there, and put them on his feet.

300-Pound Naked Man Walks into Walmart, Steals Socks: Police | NBC 10 Philadelphia

It was always going to be unwise naming a restaurant that glorifies unhealthy food the Heart Attack Grill.

And on Saturday the inevitable happened when a customer suffered a cardiac arrest in the chain’s Las Vegas branch.  An onlooker captured video of paramedics wheeling the unidentified man, thought to be in his 40s, out of the fast-food diner.He was midway through eating a 6,000-calorie Triple Bypass Burger when he began experiencing chest pains.

The restaurant chain – founded in 2005 using the catchphrase ‘Taste Worth Dying For!’ – is run by a former nutritionist ‘Doctor’ Jon Basso who, remarkably, used to run a Jenny Craig weight loss diet centre.

He denied the incident was an elaborate publicity stunt.

Mr Basso told Fox News: ‘The gentleman could barely talk. He was sweating, suffering.

‘I actually felt horrible for him because the tourists were taking photos of him as if it were some type of stunt.

‘Even with our own morbid sense of humour, we would never pull a stunt like that.’

The Heart Attack Grill sells calorie-laden fare with names such as Quadruple Bypass Burgers and Flatline Fries.

Meals can exceed 8,000 calories. The recommended daily intake is 2,000 calories for women and 2,500 for men.

The Triple Bypass Burger contains three slabs of meat, 12 rashes of bacon, cheese, red onion, sliced tomato and the Heart Attack Grill’s own ‘unique special sauce’. And that’s before taking into account the accompanying ‘Flatliner Fries’, cooked in pure lard, and a giant soft drink.

Accentuating the medical theme, waitresses dressed as nurses deliver the artery-clogging food.

A sign at the entrance to an Arizona restaurant reads: ‘Go away. If you come in this place, it’s going to kill you.’

But the chain has provoked widespread anger with promotions including offering free food to morbidly obese customers.

Heart Attack Grill customer in Las Vegas suffers cardiac arrest eating Triple Bypass Burger | Mail Online

New research shows overeating can increase the elderly’s risk of memory loss.

This new study shows older people who eat 2,100 or more calories a day had more than double the risk of memory loss compared to people who ate fewer than 1,500 calories a day.

And experts say the more calories older people consume, the more likely they are to have what’s called mild cognitive impairment, or MCI.

Doctors say MCI is the transition between normal forgetfulness caused by aging and early Alzheimer’s disease.

Study: Overeating Linked to Memory Loss in Elderly – WBAY-TV Green Bay-Fox Cities-Northeast Wisconsin News

Fat Thanks to Sona S. for the tip!

Obese Americans in the military are a national security hazard and
U.S. first lady Michelle Obama wants to see that change.

Obama, who has led a healthy eating and fitness program for
children for two years, lent her voice on Thursday to the
military’s efforts to overhaul the food it serves.

In an event at Little Rock Air Force Base, Obama announced a
new Pentagon obesity and nutritional awareness campaign that
will change nutrition standards across the services for the
first time in 20 years.

The changes will bring more fruits, vegetables, whole grains
and food choices that are lower in fat to 1.45 million troops a
day at all 1,100 American military dining facilities in the
coming months.

Pentagon attacks obesity with new food choices

The nation’s leanest state is taking its sweet time as it considers a proposal aimed at getting junk food out of schools.

A Colorado House committee was expected to discuss a bill that represents the nation’s toughest regulations meant to keep trans fat away from students, but lawmakers Thursday delayed the hearing without explanation.

The bill would forbid trans fat in cafeteria lunches — but it wouldn’t stop there.

The proposed ban would apply to snacks in vending machines, bake sale goodies and popular “a la carte” items on lunch lines such as ice creams or pizza, requiring any such treats to be prepared without artery-clogging trans fats.

Colorado lawmakers delay hearing on school trans fat ban