When is a disease not a disease? When it’s a risk factor.

Huge amounts of money are spent on treating people who are not ill. Although not ill, these people have risk factors that are treated as though they were a disease because medical science believes that if you have, for example, high LDL cholesterol, you’re more likely to have a heart attack. [Read more…]

Sin, sickness, and death. It’s an association long fixed in the American mind. At least in the mind of official America. Lately, attention has been on the sins of gluttony and sloth.

In the last few weeks, obesity has gotten considerable attention in the media. Just today, the San Francisco Chronical reported on a study presented at the annual convention of the American Heart Association. The study found that obesity is growing most rapidly among the white middle classes. [Read more…]