obesity

The name says it all - Club Bounce. And Long Beach, California folks looking to shake and rattle their rolls think that a dance club for the obese is just what doctor ordered -- for their social lives at least.

Long unable to get past the velvet ropes at traditional nightclubs because of their weight, Californians with a few (or even more than a few) extra pounds have no trouble getting in at Club Bounce. That's because the club was created to serve a specific clientele: the overweight and obese.

When you hear the words "cirrhosis of the liver", you probably think of alcohol as the cause. Most of us are aware of the link between obesity and diabetes, high blood pressure and stroke - but we don't realize how much damage excess weight can do to our livers.

Anyone who's asked my opinion about "The Biggest Loser" (and also those who haven't) knows that I have more than a few misgivings about it. So when I heard that ABC was going to launch a "reality weight loss" show, I was immediately skeptical - until I read about the premise...

Here's a clever idea. If drinking too much soda is bad for you, don't drink less of it, drink LESS of it.

Confused? Me too. But the bigwigs at Coca-Cola figure reducing the size of Coke cans to a "90 calorie mini can" is a slam-dunk to fight obesity.

Just like fun-size candy bars are! Here's the gist of it, sucking down a 90 ounce can keeps your calories down, but still lets you get your fix.

At my high school the vending machines ruled! How else could you eat nacho cheese Doritos, peanut M&M's, and raw Pop-Tarts for lunch?

But nowadays, with the number of overweight and obese kids on the rise, vending machines and junk food are getting the heave-ho from schools.

And according to a new survey by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, more and more schools are expelling the junk.

Lots of people think it's okay, normal even, to pack on 10 pounds or more a decade. We call it middle-age spread. But, those extra pounds may decrease a woman's risk of leading a long, healthy life free of chronic disease.

Published in the British Medical Journal, this latest study to tackle the connection between weight gain and life expectancy, found the more weight a woman gained in mid-life, the less likely she was to be healthy and disease free (or even alive) after age 70.

BMI gets a lot of flack. The gripe you hear most is it doesn't consider muscle mass.

Let's say you're short and have big muscles, your BMI will call you obese. It's happened to me for years.

Experts say a similar glitch occurs in old folks. Body composition changes as you age, meaning BMI becomes less accurate over time.

For some reason, people are mean to Casey Wilson. As a fan of Saturday Night Live, I could never figure that out. SNL might not have been the best format for her, and she wasn't always given the best roles, but she's one funny lady.

Casey showed grace this week when Lorne Michaels fired her from his show, sparking rumors that she was fired because she'd been asked to lose 30 pounds over the summer and either failed to, or refused.

Everyone is doing a boatload of screaming about healthcare lately, and it sounds like everybody has a different vision of how to redo it.

So, no matter what side of the debate you fall on, we can all agree U.S. healthcare is broken and needs to be fixed fast, before it gets worse.

And some health experts think it all starts with obesity, curbing the epidemic early on.

Results from a UK study show that children with low self-esteem tend to be obese as adults.

The study followed 6,500 children (from the 1970 British Birth Cohort Study), who had their height and weight measured at the age of 10, and were also asked about their emotional state.

Twenty years later, researchers have published the results in the BMC Medicine Journal.

Stop me if you've heard this one before. In the never-ending search for an obesity panacea, researchers from the University of Central Florida are confident they will have one.

They have identified a new genetic mechanism, which controls the body's fat-building process.

Obese people should go vegetarian, or so says PETA.

The much maligned animal rights group's new message is, "Save the Whales" by giving up meat if you need to lose weight. It's clever, but is it effective?

How do you solve a problem? Study it, brainstorm and develop a course of action? Or, do you throw a bunch of money at it and hope for the best?

That's what the United States government intends to do to stop obesity. The amount of cash to be doled out is "significant," said one official.

It's basically fighting fire with fire. Yesterday, it was reported that obesity costs the U.S. healthcare system $147 billion a year.

I guess it's like Texas, everything is bigger when you're obese. The extra $1,500 is 41% more than an average-weight person spends each year.

In total, the yearly cost of obesity in the United States is $147 billion, or 9% of all medical expenses. And, it figures to get worse now that the average American is 23 pounds overweight.

If you eat a dozen Krispy Kreme doughnuts and then start bouncing off the walls, it's safe to say your brain activity has been altered.

It could also go the other way. If you eat a bunch of doughnuts and then purge because of shame, you'd be pretty bummed out.

That's why experts believe new findings on the effects of high-fat, high-sugar foods on brain receptors may give insight into eating disorders.

As kid, they warn you about drugs. At first it seems fun, but soon you'll need more and more to get high and before you know it, you're addicted.

Junk food is a lot like drugs. Lay's potato chips even had a marketing slogan, "betcha you can't eat just one." Sounds like a drug pusher to me!

And, a new study claims snack foods may trigger a drug addiction-like response in obese women.

New data has suggested that obesity, especially extreme obesity (BMI over 40), raises swine flu victims' chance of dying.

The study, published in advance by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, looked at the cases of ten swine flu patients at a Michigan hospital, all of whom had to be placed on ventilators due to the severity of their illness.

No one wants to win the booby prize, but sorry Mississippi, you just did.

The CDC says Mississippi is the fattest state in the U.S., where 32.5% of people are obese.

And, to make matters worse, obesity among adults increased in 23 states over the past year, with no state showing a major decline.

According to new research a mother's weight, and the amount she gains during pregnancy, may have an impact on her daughter's risk of obesity decades later.

This research has important implications for the future - if women can reach a healthy weight before they begin their family, it has the potential to impact two generations. This is exciting stuff!

With the growing obesity epidemic studies like these are particularly important.