WIHI: Tipping the Scales: Fresh Ideas to Combat Obesity

Date: February 18, 2010

Featuring:

• David Kessler, MD, FDA Commissioner (1990-1997), Professor, UCSF School of Medicine
• Charles J. Homer, MD, MPH, President and CEO, National Initiative for Children’s Healthcare Quality
• Rachelle Mirkin, Executive Program Director, National Initiative for Children’s Healthcare Quality

Hardly a day goes by anymore, it seems, that doesn’t include new research findings about obesity and its health consequences. At the same time, headlines heralding the latest tactics to help Americans, especially, shed the excess pounds often compete for space with some of the most sophisticated advertising ever to lead us to precisely the foods wreaking havoc with our bodies and brains. The former head of the US Food and Drug Administration, David Kessler, identifies with those of us gaining and losing weight, like the seasons, and our seemingly insatiable desires for foods high in sugar, salt, and fat. That’s why he wrote the book, The End of Overeating, and he’s hoping his investigation adds to the understanding of the levers needed to turn the obesity epidemic around.​​

WIHI host Madge Kaplan welcomes Dr. Kessler to the program, along with two national leaders, Charles Homer and Rachelle Mirkin, who are helping to provide communities and health care providers with known best practices to combat obesity in children. If ever there was a frontline for effective strategies, it is with kids who are otherwise on track for a lifetime of chronic and serious illness. Forty billion dollars in increased medical spending in the US because of obesity, according to one recent analysis, gets our attention. But, if you’re wondering what’s working, where, to reverse this spiral, this WIHI features an urgent discussion about obesity and what experts are learning about best ways to focus interventions and efforts.