Childhood Obesity in America: Biography of an Epidemic

Western culture once thought obesity meant happiness, health, and prosperity, though we now recognize its links to unhappiness, illness, and early death. Yet it still exists—why is this, and what can we do about it? Dawes, a historian of medicine, dutifully catalogues society’s stumbling attempts to understand and deal with this subject over the past century. She reviews many failed attempts to keep childhood obesity in check, from the “endocrine vogue of the 1920s to the 1940s” to diet drugs, bariatric surgery, and the leptin gene craze. Advertising geared toward making bad foods attractive to kids has been rampant and governments have done a poor job controlling it. However, there have been successes: after much arm-twisting, the American Beverage Association agreed to try to eliminate sugary sodas from middle and elementary schools, although a later study found sodas were still available to 83.9% of elementary students. But some political leaders are scoring points—particularly First Lady Michelle Obama—and lawsuits may help. Dawes ably demonstrates that any solutions will likely be as multifaceted as the problem. Illus. (June)