Another prescription for fat.

• Author: Gruman, Jessie C.
• Position: Letters

It's about time someone looked at the obesity epidemic as a public health issue the way Tom Farley and Deborah Cohen did ("Fixing a Fat Nation" December 2001). They note the pervasive advertising and availability of fast food, snack food, and junk food and our cultural habit of consuming sweet and fatty foods as a treat. Those are powerful determinants of our eating habits and tough influences to overcome. One potential force in the obesity struggle that the article neglected was doctors, who for most of us retain an authoritative role on health matters. It appears that physicians have generally bowed out of the struggle against obesity. Despite the...