The FDA has proposed new labels on grocery store food products, that adjust serving sizes to more accurately capture what Americans eat. Research I conducted with Steven Dallas and Peggy Liu suggests these labels could be a problem. Here is a great media story on our findings: Last year, the Food and Drug Administration announced…
Can beliefs make you fat? The answer to this question might seem pretty obvious. If I believe that the best way to lose weight is to super-size five meals a day at McDonald’s, while consuming bags of Doritos to tide me over between meals, that belief is probably going to make me fat. If I…
What would you like first: the good news or the bad news? Let me start with the bad. Life expectancy among patients in the U.S. with thyroid cancer lags behind that in Korea. In fact, the vast majority of patients diagnosed with thyroid cancer in Korea are cured of that illness, a statement I can’t…
In June of 2013, the American Medical Association officially recognized obesity as a disease. The organization had its reasons. For starters, obesity leads to heart attacks, strokes, diabetes, early-onset degenerative arthritis…and just about every other illness on the planet. In addition, people with obesity face a very difficult time overcoming their condition: Short of highly…
In a few months, we will find out whether the Supreme Court has decided that a critical part of the Affordable Care Act is unconstitutional. If that happens, lots of people will be in lots of trouble, financially speaking. Here is a wonderful article in a North Carolina newspaper laying out some of the issues…
Here is a nice follow-up story on my recent New England Journal article on improving the design of health insurance exchanges. Comparing health insurance plans – whether signing up through Healthcare.gov or weighing employer-sponsored plans with a spouse – can feel like wading through a sea of information on deductibles, co-payments and monthly premiums. Now…
Smoking kills. But you knew that already. So does second-hand smoke. Inhaling a smoker’s exhalations can cause heart disease and cancer. But now it turns out that just watching other people smoke is dangerous, especially if those other people are movie stars inhaling on the big screen (in their inimitably attractive ways). Researchers reviewing the…
The stairs to the left of the escalator don’t just look like a piano keyboard, but make musical sounds as people walk on each step. Not convinced this will work? Check out this video, which shows people heading towards the escalator, and then changing direction when they realize how fun it will be to climb…
India is not, yet, a wealthy country. Nevertheless its people experience many of the same expensive-to-treat illnesses as wealthier populations in the U.S. and Europe. Therefore the country has made a series of policy decisions designed to lower the cost of medical treatments. For example, until 2005, it offered no – I repeat, no –…
I’m not sure why I didn’t notice this earlier, but I just came across a very gracious, even overly generous, review of my book, Critical Decisions in the leading journal of bioethics, The Hastings Center Report. I thought I would share it with you: When I finally got eyeglasses as a teenager, after denying the…