Showing posts with label obesity. Show all posts
Showing posts with label obesity. Show all posts

Tuesday, October 02, 2012

Dear a-hole: You've just been owned


Here's one guy in La Crosse, Wis., who's going to think twice about writing a local TV morning-show anchor to tell her how fat she is.

Unfortunately, the jerk probably still won't hesitate to belittle others who don't have a television station at their disposal. Still, Jennifer Livingston of WKBT rocks.

And so does her outraged husband, Channel 8 evening news anchor Mike Thompson.


HAT TIP: Romenesko.

Sunday, January 25, 2009

I done caught the fat . . . sniffle, cough

It's not your fault you're a lard ass. It's an illness.

That's my story, and I'm sticking to it. Cough, cough.

AND IT'S ALL in The Daily Express, across the pond in London:
Obesity can be “caught” as easily as a common cold from other people’s coughs, sneezes and dirty hands, scientists will claim today.

Researchers believe that an airborne “adenovirus” germ could be causing the fat plague that is blighting Britain and other countries.

As many as one in three obese people may have become overweight after falling victim to the highly infectious cold-like virus, known as AD-36.
It is known to cause coughs, sore throats, diarrhoea and conjunctivitis but has now also been found to make fat cells multiply, leading to weight gain.

The shocking discovery will add to evidence that Britain’s obesity epidemic is not simply down to an unhealthy diet or lack of exercise.

Research suggests a third of UK adults will be grossly overweight within three years, with Britain even predicted to overtake the US as the most obese nation in the world.

The problem already causes 9,000 premature deaths in the UK a year and costs the NHS £1billion.

Many experts already believe that genes can make some people more susceptible to weight gain and now it seems that infections could also hold the key.

Studies have shown that chickens and mice infected with AD-36 put on weight quicker than uninfected animals, even when they were not given extra food. It has also been found to cause huge weight gain in monkeys.

Now studies on humans show that 33 per cent of obese adults had contracted AD-36 at some point in their lives, compared with only 11 per cent of lean men and women.

Professor Nikhil Dhurandhar, of Pennington Biomedical Research Centre in Louisiana, US, who led the research, said AD-36 continued to add weight gain long after those infected had seemingly recovered.

His studies indicated that the virus lingers for up to three months, during which time it multiplies fat and is contagious to others.

Dr Dhurandhar, who will make the extraordinary claims on BBC2’s Horizon tonight, said: “We now know that this virus goes to the lungs and spreads to various organs such as the liver, kidney, brain and fat tissue.

“When it goes to fat tissue it replicates, making more copies of itself and in the process increases the number of new fat cells, which may explain why people get fat when they are infected with this virus.” The findings were welcomed by some medical experts, although others sounded a note of caution.
OH . . . BY THE WAY. This stunning scientific breakthrough -- and it really is, you know -- came out of the Pennington Biomedical Research Center in Baton Rouge, part of Louisiana State University.

The state has informed LSU, as well as all other Louisiana colleges and universities, to brace for a reduction in state funding of between 18 percent and 30 percent. Social services and education are two of the few areas of state spending not protected by the Louisiana constitution.

Meanwhile, amid a historic budget crisis, some nimrods in the Gret Stet want to raise the homestead exemption to $170,000 from $75,000. That way, elementary and secondary education can be in just as deep doo as higher ed.

Deeper, actually. Local schools in Louisiana ain't so hot to start with.

SO, WHEN the cuts come and the research programs wither away, just remember that you're doomed to stay fat because Louisiana doesn't value education. Or health. Or any of the stuff the rest of us suck it up and pay taxes for, just because it's the right thing to do.