Fat Brazil

Thin may be in but fat's where it's at!

Too often countries around the world play with their figures (pun intended) to present a more svelte-like appearance to their fat facts.  The US is most often the first criticized.

Perhaps if we accumulate enough evidence ....

Brazilian bikinis burgeon to fit the fat

Jan 28, 2012

3:10 PM (ET)
By JENNY BARCHFIELD

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) - Tall and tan and young and ... chunky?

The Girl From Ipanema has put on a few pounds, and for many sunbathers on Brazil's beaches the country's iconic itsy-bitsy, teeny-weeny bikini just doesn't suffice anymore.

A growing number of bikini manufacturers have woken up to Brazil's thickening waistline and are reaching out to the ever-expanding ranks of heavy women with new plus-size lines.

That's nothing short of a revolution in this most body-conscious of nations, where overweight ladies long had little choice but to hit the beach in comely ensembles of oversized T-shirts and biker shorts.

"It used to be bikinis were only in tiny sizes that only skinny girls could fit into. But not everyone is built like a model," said Elisangela Inez Soares as she sunbathed on Copacabana beach, her oiled-up curves packed into a black size 12 bikini.

"Finally, it seems like people are beginning to realize that we're not all Gisele," said the 38-year-old mother of four, referring to willowy Brazilian supermodel Gisele Bundchen.

Clothing designer Clarice Rebelatto said her own swimwear-hunting travails prompted her to found Lehona, an exclusively plus-size beachwear line.

"Honestly, the problem went way beyond just bikinis. In Brazil, it used to be that if you were even a little chunky, finding any kind of clothes in the right size was a real problem," said Rebelatto, herself a size 10. "And I thought, 'I'm actually not even that big compared to a lot of women out there, so if I have problems, what are they doing?'"

Since its launch in 2010, the line has become a hit.

In brash leopard spots and flower prints not meant for wallflowers, the label's 14 bikini styles aren't what you'd normally associate with plus-size swimsuits. The necklines plunge dramatically. Straps are mere strings. And while the bottoms provide too much coverage to qualify for the famed "fio dental" or "dental floss" category of Brazilian string bikinis, they're significantly more audacious than the standard U.S. cut.

"We're working from the principle that bigger women are just like everyone else: They don't want to look like old ladies, wearing these very modest, very covering swimsuits in just black," said Luiz Rebelatto, Clarice's son and director of Lehona.

He said that recent publicity of the brand and several other new swimwear lines catering to plus sizes has triggered an overwhelming number of calls and e-mails from would-be customers.

"They're all excited and they say, 'I've been looking everywhere for a bikini like that. Where can I get one?'" said Rebelatto.

Lehona is currently sold exclusively at big and tall specialty stores throughout Brazil. Its bikinis retail for about 130 reais or $75 - a relatively high price-point here, but Rebelatto said sales have grown at a galloping pace, though he did not provide any figures.

It's the same story at Acqua Rosa, a conventional swimwear label that added a plus-size line in 2008. Now, plus-size purchases account for more than 70 percent of the brand's total sales, said director Joao Macedo.

It makes sense.

For centuries, large swaths of Brazil were beset by malnutrition, and in 1970, nearly 10 percent of the population in the country's poor, rural northeast region was considered underweight, according to Brazil's national statistics institute.

But the phenomenal economic boom that has lifted tens of millions out of poverty and into the burgeoning middle class over the past decade has also changed the nation's once-svelte physique: A 2010 study by the statistics institute showed that 48 percent of adult women and 50 percent of men are now overweight. In 1985 those figures were 29 percent for women and 18 percent for men.

(Still, there's been no rash of plus-size male swimwear lines, as men here wear Speedo-style suits that don't impinge on big guts.)

Analysts attribute Brazil's rapidly widening girth to changes in nutrition, with chips, processed meats and sugary soft drinks replacing staples like rice, beans and vegetables.

And while the country's elite are widely known to be fitness freaks - and also among the world's top consumers of cosmetic surgery - those recently lifted out of poverty and manual labor are becoming increasingly sedentary. A 2008 study showed that barely 10 percent of Brazilian teens and adults exercise regularly.

Still, despite their growing numbers, not everyone is eager to embrace "gordinhas" - or "little fatties," as chunky women are affectionately known here.

Many high-end bikini-makers have turned a seemingly deliberately blind eye to the burgeoning plus-size market. Rio-based upmarket brand Salinas, for example, offers five sizes, from extra-small through extra-large. But their sizing runs notoriously small and it's hard to imagine anyone over a size 6 actually managing to fit into any of the brand's minuscule two-pieces.

Luis Rebelatto of Lehona chalked it partially up to snobbery.

"Some brands, they don't want their image to be associated with chunky women," he said. "Only the thin, the rich and the chic."

While Brazilians' increasing heft is a public policy preoccupation for the government, growth in the ranks of the overweight population has given them increased visibility in Brazilian society. Extra-wide bucket seats for the obese have been installed in Sao Paulo's metro system, and on Sunday the city will host Brazil's first ever Miss Plus Size beauty contest.

"It used to be that people would stare at me," said Soares, the voluptuous sun-worshiper on Copacabana beach. "Now when I come to the beach I see women who are much bigger than me - and lots of them are wearing bikinis - so I'm not self conscious any more.

"God makes some people thin but he made me like this," she said, rubbing down the well-oiled bulge of her stomach and thighs. "So who am I to think that he was wrong?"

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Fat: It's All Their Fault (awfully Judgmental)

This article says it all - the fat tax is not to save anyone nor pay for any health care, it is primarily to raise money and why?  because they are already taxing everyone and need a new source for taxation.  You need only be mildly imaginative to conjure up great ideas for new taxes:
1)  charging prisoners - we have 3 million people in jail at $30-50k a year.  Why not lower the standards, a TV in common area, but if you want to pay more you can have a private TV.  You could also pay more to eat alone.  And of course, you cannot do this for every prison and every prisoner - but for the less offensive of those incarcerated.  Want to bet it will happen?  It already is to some degree - celebrities check themselves into a jail in Lynwood.  They pay for their stay, but their accommodations are better and it is less like County than County.  Coming soon to a jail near you. 
2) television license:  they have that here in England.  You pay a license fee each year to have television service, and then you pay your cable/satellite bill.
3) mileage fee: you drive 10 miles you pay $1 a year, you drive 12,000 miles you pay $1,000 a year.  Each state would be factored in and some multiplier would be used.  In Delaware they would start with 0 miles free whereas in California, we would all receive 8,000 miles free - above the free level, would be taxed - separate from the gas tax and separate from the license and registration.

And I came up with these in a few moments.  Think what Obama can conjure up given the multitudes who serve him.



Be ready.  Be prepared.  The time is close when we will be taxed based upon the number of windows in our homes.








Germany Weighs Tax on the Obese



Hugh Collins
AOL News (July 23, 2010)



Marco Wanderwitz, a conservative member of parliament for the German state of Saxony, said it is unfair and unsustainable for the taxpayer to carry the entire cost of treating obesity-related illnesses in the public health system.

"I think that it would be sensible if those who deliberately lead unhealthy lives would be held financially accountable for that," Wanderwitz said, according to Reuters.

Germany's health system is paid for by a series of mandatory health insurance funds, all of which are reporting serious deficits as the system is overused.  [And how will Obama keep ourt system from being 'overused'?]

Germany, famed for its beer, pork and chocolates, is one of the fattest countries in Europe. Twenty-one percent of German adults were obese in 2007, and the German newspaper Bild estimates that the cost of treating obesity-related illnesses is about 17 billion euro, or $21.7 billion, a year.

Walter Willett, a professor of nutrition at the Harvard School of Public Health, described the idea of a fat tax as "not humane." He told AOL News that lifestyle is not the only factor in obesity, with both genetics and urban environments playing major roles.

"It's not fair to tax somebody just for being obese," Willett said. "Most people who are obese would prefer not to be so."

Health economist Jurgen Wasem called for Germany to tackle the problem of fattening snacks in order to raise money and reduce obesity.

"One should, as with tobacco, tax the purchase of unhealthy consumer goods at a higher rate and partly maintain the health system," Wasem said, according to Germany's English-language newspaper The Local. "That applies to alcohol, chocolate or risky sporting equipment such as hang-gliders."

Others are suggesting even more extreme measures. The German teachers association recently called for school kids to be weighed each day, The Daily Telegraph said.

The fat kids could then be reported to social services, who could send them to health clinics.

Willett identified improving children's diets as one of the most effective ways to deal with obesity and spiraling health care costs.

"The fact that we're not feeding our kids as well as we can is very foolish," Willett told AOL News.













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Science and Fat People

Well, we will need to remove these genes from babies, or risk serious health care problems later in life.  Isn't science wonderful.




Gene makes people fat, raises Alzheimer's risk




By Julie Steenhuysen
April 19, 2010
Reuters


CHICAGO (Reuters) – A variant of an obesity gene carried by more than a third of the U.S. population also reduces brain volume, raising carriers' risk of Alzheimer's disease, U.S. researchers said on Monday.

People with a specific variant of the fat mass and obesity gene, or FTO gene, have brain deficits that could make them more vulnerable to the mind-robbing disease.

"The basic result is that this very prevalent gene not only adds an inch to your waistline, but makes your brain look 16 years older," said Paul Thompson, a professor of neurology at the University of California Los Angeles, who worked on the study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Brains generally shrink with age.

The study compared brain scans of more than 200 people and found consistently less tissue in the brains of people who carry the "bad" version of the FTO gene compared to non-carriers.

On average, people with the obesity variant of the FTO gene had 8 percent less tissue in their frontal lobes -- sometimes referred to as the brain's "command center." They also had 12 percent less tissue in their occipital lobes, which is the part of the brain that processes vision and other perceptions.

Thompson said reduced brain volume raises a person's risk for Alzheimer's disease by reducing the amount of brain reserve a person has to compensate if the brain plaques linked to Alzheimer's form. Stroke can also reduce brain tissue, depleting the brain's reserve.

DIET AND EXERCISE

The added brain risk means it is more important for people who carry the FTO gene to eat a low-fat diet and exercise regularly, he said.

A 2008 study of Amish people who had the FTO risk gene but were physically active found they weighed about the same as non-carriers, suggesting that physical activity can overcome a genetic predisposition to obesity.

People with two copies of the FTO gene variant on average weigh nearly 7 pounds (3 kg) more and are about 70 percent more likely to be obese than those who do not have the gene.

"In all the maelstrom of activities you do, exercise and a low-fat diet are genuinely saving your brain from both stroke and Alzheimer's," Thompson said.

For the study, Thompson's team compared magnetic resonance images taken of the brains of 206 healthy people between age 55 and 90 at 58 centers. The centers were taking part in the five-year Alzheimer's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative, which is examining the factors that help aging brains resist disease.

Because so many people carry the obesity version of the FTO gene, Thompson said the findings may drive research into new drug compounds to alter the effects on the brain.

Short of that, he said the findings should lead carriers to eat less and exercise more.

There is no cure for Alzheimer's disease, the most common form of dementia affecting 26 million people globally.

Current treatments help with some symptoms, but cannot reverse the course of the disease, leading many scientific teams to look for ways to prevent it.


The study is available at
http://www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.0910878107

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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Eat Popcorn and Get Fat: Daily Caloric Instake in ONE Bucket of Popcorn

Sweet Popcorn would be the equivalent of caramel corn I believe - not relevant at any theater I have been to in the US.

While the numbers are English - from their popcorn and theaters, popcorn with the oil they use and buttery flavoring would be about the same - or maybe more.

In any case - a reasonable standard to compare to.




A 1,800 calorie bag of popcorn: Cinemas urged to warn film lovers about fat-filled snacks


By Daily Mail Reporter
27th February 2010


Cinema-goers should be warned about how many calories are contained in popular snacks such as popcorn, fizzy drink and icecream, according to the nutrition watchdog.

The Food Standards Agency is also concerned that portion sizes offered to filmgoers are getting out of control and have called on cinemas to act to tackle the obesity crisis.

It follows claims that a large bag of sweet popcorn could contain an alarming 1,800 calories - the equivalent of a large curry with sides and two bottles of beer.

A large salted popcorn did not fare much better than the sweet variety, containing 1,779 calories - the same as a three course meal of pizza, garlic bread and tiramisu.

The large popcorn bags are intended for sharing but are often eaten by just one person.

The agency's chief executive Tim Smith told The Times that cinemas should provide calorie information on their snacks.

'There is a myth that popcorn is calorie-free, but that is not the case. It is a concern to us,' he said.

'Portion sizes are also a big issue, and there seems to be increasingly big packs on sale. Who would ever have thought of the idea of a family needing a wheelbarrow to go into a cinema?'

He also urged cinemas to provide smaller portion sizes.

Popcorn isn't the only food of concern. Hot dogs contain about 650 calories, nachos with cheese could contain as much as 716 calories and a large Coca Cola has 328 calories, according to nutritionists.

Mr Smith spoke out as a number of food chains such as Pret A Manger, Wimpey and The Real Greek decided to put calorie counts on all their menus.

A trial scheme with 21 food companies took place last summer, and has already suggested that consumers alter their buying habits after reading how many calories are in certain products.

'The emerging evidence is that people are picking products which have 100 calories fewer than their normal purchase,' Mr Smith told The Times.

'It seems where there is choice between a chicken salad with 420 calories and one with 320 calories they are picking the lower one. One company has also told us that there is no profit impact on providing the information in cafés or on front of packs and there may even be a competitive advantage'

The Food Standards Agency is hoping to enlist support from cinemas and other entertainment venues, including football grounds and concert arenas, to tackle the obesity crisis.

It has already held talks with cinema suppliers PepsiCo and Coca-Cola.

Mr Smith added: 'When Coke started out in America it was sold in a 5oz bottle and now you can get it in a 64oz bucket. There are 20 fluid ounces in a pint, so that is a three and a bit pints. There can be nothing materially sensible about that, and no one needs that amount of soft drink.'

He said entertainment venues needed to take responsibility.

'It’s the same story. These are all areas where people are buying, albeit sporadically, high-energy items in large portions.'

Cineworld said it was in the process of improving nutritional information for all food and drink on sale at venues.


It comes as research this week showed that eight out of 10 men and almost seven in 10 women will be overweight or obese by 2020.







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Chavez: Venezuelans are FAT and need exercise.

Women do not get fat - they fill out, unlike the nearly 80% in the Gulf region who are not obese, but 'really filled out'.  I am waiting for him to blame the US for his weight issues.


He needs to swallow some arsenic.





The Chavez Diet: Venezuelans urged to lose weight



(AP)
November 13, 2009



CARACAS, Venezuela — Call it the Bolivarian battle of the bulge.

President Hugo Chavez said in a televised speech Friday that "there are lots of fat people" in Venezuela and advised his supporters to exercise and eat healthy to trim their waistlines.

"I'm not saying fat women, because they never get fat," he added. "Women sometimes fill out."

The 55-year-old leader said he himself has lost nearly 20 pounds (9 kilograms) by exercising and eating well. But Chavez, who still appears heavier than when he first took office in 1999, acknowledged that he could lose a few more pounds (kilograms).

"Doing sit ups," he said. "Eating well. One has to learn how to eat."

Chavez suggested rice pasta instead of spaghetti made from wheat, and recommended drinking soy milk, saying soy products help fight aging.

Chavez said his diet and exercise have made him feel stronger and "ready to continue commanding the Bolivarian Revolution" — the name he has given his socialist-inspired political movement.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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Gulf Women: REALLY fat - all due to children say women. Husbands prefer family goat.

Can't imagine why!




Up to 70% of Gulf women are obese


September 29, 2005
Middle East Online


Study released in Qatar reveals obesity is also taking toll on children in oil-rich Gulf states.



DOHA - Up to 70 percent of women and 50 percent of men living in the oil-rich Gulf Arab states are overweight or obese, according to a study released at a seminar in Qatar on Thursday.

"Obesity occurs much more often in women in Gulf states where it affects 50 to 70 percent of married women and 30 to 50 percent of married men," said a study presented by Qatari expert Issam Abd Rabbu at the "Facts About Obesity" seminar.

Rabbu said the problem was also taking a toll on children, "affecting five to 10 percent of pre-school children" at a rate that grows "to 10 to 15 percent of primary school children ... then 20 to 40 percent for secondary school children".

These obesity rates are "much higher than in developed countries", he said in his study, called "Obesity: The Illness of the Century."

He blamed obesity among Gulf women, in part, on "repeated pregnancies without a reasonable interval" of time.

Otherwise, obesity is due to poor nutritional habits and lack of exercise by Gulf residents, Rabbu said.

Rabbu said the statistics in his study covered people suffering from being "overweight, obese, excessively obese and morbidly obese".

Some 32 million people live in the Gulf monarchies - Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates - and foreigners account for more than a third of the population.








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Half of Europe fat but sees no health threat: report

Europe is fat and getting fatter.


Reuters
February 28, 2006, 1:16 pm ET
Darren Ennis


Half of Europe fat but sees no health threat: report


BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Half of Europeans are obese or overweight, but citizens do not see obesity as a major health threat, a food industry report said on Tuesday.

According to the report, commissioned by Kraft, the world's second largest food and beverage company, Euroepans view obesity as a problem that affects others, but not themselves.

Of 15 health concerns listed in the report, obesity and being overweight ranked fifth and ninth respectively.  Cancer and heart disease topped the poll.


[There is more, but ...]

**************************************


The rest of this news article could be copied out, or someone could find it - I tried, and I guess I must keep my hard copy as I cannot find an online version any longer.



The issue I believe worth noting - the Europeans have a relatively homogenous population with an increase of Muslims, but setting aside that factor, they are and remain relatively homogenous.

The United States is not, has not been - rather, we are the emptying point for people from everywhere - particularly south of the border. 

Our overweight issues are explainable with a study of demographics.  Europe cannot say that nor can they distinguish their obesity issues to one or two variables rather than as something endemic to their culture.








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Thin may be in, but fat is protected in England

I suppose this would be at odds with current policies: one of which i posted in the last two weeks - punish those people overweight or unhealthy.  Which will mean, under any health reform - Democrats discriminate against fat people.

(always useful to receive these links/articles from people - they help fill up my filing cabinet)





Overweight 'should be protected'


October 19, 2009
BBC News
Attacking someone for being fat should be a hate crime, campaigners say.

They want so-called "fat-ism" to be made illegal on the same grounds as race, age and religious discrimination.

A demonstration was held outside the offices of the mayor of London asking him to lead the way in making sure employers are not prejudiced.

Protesters want the UK to follow San Francisco, where a law bans "fat-ism" in housing and employment and stops doctors pressing patients to slim down.

Sondra Solway, a San Francisco lawyer, said: "The San Francisco ordinance says you may want to mention weight to the patient but if the patient says they do not want to talk about that then you are asked to respect those wishes."

Size acceptance

In the UK, size is not a protected characteristic under discrimination legislation.

The campaigners, who belong to the Size Acceptance Movement, say surveys show 93% of employers would rather employ a thin person than a fat one even if they are equally qualified.

Kathryn Szrodecki, who campaigns on behalf of overweight people, said that in the UK fat people were stared at, pointed at, talked about and attacked.

She said: "I have been discriminated against - I am a YMCA qualified fitness instructor, but I have gone for jobs and been laughed off the premises."

Another campaigner, Marsha Coupe, said: "I have been punched, I have had beer thrown in my face, I have had people attack me on the train.

"They say 'Move out of the way fatty! Well person coming down the aisle!'"

Ms Szrodecki said: "This is a very common event - someone being beaten up should be a crime.

"It is not about who you are or what you have done, it is just about the way you look.

"You are allowed to shame us just because of the way we look."

Dr Ian Campbell of the charity Weight Concern said he was doubtful that legislation would have any immediate effect on the situation.

He said: "People who are very overweight do experience a lot of prejudice both in their social life and working life and do need some protection.

"We know that genetic and social reasons can lead to this very complex problem.

"For instance, people in inner cities are much more likely to be overweight because of poorer education, poorer housing and poorer job opportunities.

"Not everyone has a free choice about controlling their weight."

A spokesman for the Equality and Human Rights Commission said size was already protected by the legislation if it was caused by a disability: "Potentially human rights legislation would also cover people by protecting their right to work."




 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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Fat? It's not your fault - it's what's in your food, blame someone else.

The Surprising Ingredient Causing Weight Gain


By Margaret Furtado, M.S., R.D.
Jul 27, 2009, 12:23 am PDT


Say it isn't so! A recent study out of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill cites what animal studies have hinted at for years: MSG (aka monosodium glutamate) could be a factor in weight gain.

The study focused on 750 Chinese men and women, ages 40-59, living in 3 rural villages in north and south China. Most of the study subjects prepared their meals at home without commercially processed foods and roughly 82 percent used MSG. Those participants who used the highest amounts of MSG had nearly 3 times the incidence of overweight as those who did not use MSG, even when physical activity, total caloric intake, and other possible explanations for body mass differences were accounted for. The positive correlation between MSG and higher weight confirmed what animal studies have been suggesting for years.

Maybe you're wondering what monosodium glutamate is exactly, and what you can do to avoid it in your diet. MSG is a flavor enhancer in foods—some believe it may even provide a fifth basic taste sensation (in addition to sweet, sour, salt, and bitter), what the Japanese call "umami" (roughly translated as "tastiness"). MSG is considered an "excitotoxin," since its action in the body is to excite neurotransmitters (important brain chemicals), causing nerve cells to discharge and also exciting nerves related to taste. Perhaps this ability to excite these nerves is a factor in an association between increased MSG usage and weight gain.

How prevalent is MSG in the U.S. diet? Americans consumed about 1 million pounds of MSG in 1950, and today that number has increased by a factor of 300!


To read the rest of the article, click on the title link





[I will expect that the Obama Health Plan - OHP - will cover the disease formerly known at being fat)







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More Healthcare - Charge the Fat People

Tough love for fat people: Tax their food to pay for healthcare

July 27, 2009
LA Times



When historians look back to identify the pivotal moments in the nation's struggle against obesity, they might point to the current period as the moment when those who influenced opinion and made public policy decided it was time to take the gloves off.


As evidence of this new "get-tough" strategy on obesity, they may well cite a study released today by the Urban Institute titled "Reducing Obesity: Policy Strategies From the Tobacco Wars."


In the debate over healthcare reform, the added cost of caring for patients with obesity-related diseases has become a common refrain: most recent is the cost-of-obesity study, also released today by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It finds that as obesity rates increased from 18.3% of Americans in 1998 to 25% in 2006, the cost of providing treatment for those patients' weight-driven problems increased healthcare spending by $40 billion a year.


If you happen to be the 1-in-3 Americans who is neither obese nor overweight (and, thus, considered at risk of becoming obese), you might well conclude that the habits of the remaining two-thirds of Americans are costing you, big time. U.S. life expectancies are expected to slide backward, after years of marching upward. (But that's their statistical problem: Yours is how to make them stop costing you all that extra money because they are presumably making poor choices in their food consumption.)


"Facing the serious consequences of an uncontrolled obesity epidemic, America's state and federal policy makers may need to consider interventions every bit as forceful as those that succeeded in cutting adult tobacco use by more than 50%," the Urban Institute report says. It took awhile -- almost 50 years from the first surgeon general's report on tobacco in 1964 -- to drive smoking down. But in many ways, the drumbeat of scientific evidence and the growing cultural stigma against obesity already are well underway -- as any parent who has tried to bring birthday cupcakes into her child's classroom certainly knows.


Key among the "interventions" the report weighs is that of imposing an excise or sales tax on fattening foods. That, says the report, could be expected to lower consumption of those foods.



But it would also generate revenues that could be used to extend health insurance coverage to the uninsured and under-insured, and perhaps to fund campaigns intended to make healthy foods more widely available to, say, low-income Americans and to encourage exercise and healthy eating habits.


If anti-tobacco campaigns are to be the model, those sales taxes could be hefty: The World Health Organization has recommended that tobacco taxes should represent between two-thirds and three-quarters of the cost of, say, a package of cigarettes; a 2004 report prepared for the Department of Agriculture suggested that, for "sinful-food" taxes to change the way people eat, they may need to equal at least 10% to 30% of the cost of the food.

And although 40 U.S. states now impose modest extra sales taxes on soft drinks and a few snack items, the Urban Institute report suggests that a truly forceful "intervention" -- one that would drive down the consumption of fattening foods and, presumably, prevent or reverse obesity -- would have to target pretty much all the fattening and nutritionally empty stuff we eat: "With a more narrowly targeted tax, consumers could simply substitute one fattening food or beverage for another," the reports says.

Of course, the United States also would have to adopt extensive menu- and food-labeling changes that would make "good foods" easily distinguishable from the bad ones subject to added taxes. Not to worry though: Several European countries, most notably Great Britain, have led the way in this area.

And here's the payoff: Conservatively estimated, a 10% tax levied on foods that would be defined as "less healthy" by a national standard adopted recently in Great Britain could yield $240 billion in its first five years and $522 billion over 10 years of implementation -- if it were to begin in October 2010. If lawmakers instituted a program of tax subsidies to encourage the purchase of fresh and processed fruits and vegetables, the added revenue would still be $356 billion over 10 years.

That would pay for a lot of healthcare reform, which some have estimated will cost as much as $1 trillion to implement over the next ten years.

There can be little doubt that lobbyists for the food, restaurant and grocery industries would come out swinging on any of these proposals. But the report cites evidence of a turning political tide for proposals that would hold the obese and other consumers of nutritionally suspect food accountable for their choices. A recent national poll found that 53% of Americans said they favored an increased tax on sodas and sugary soft drinks to help pay for healthcare reform. And even among those who opposed such an idea, 63% switched and said they'd favor such a tax if it "would raise money for health-care reform while also tackling the problems that stem from being overweight."











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