A lot of people don't take the risks of high cholesterol very seriously. After all, one out of five people have high cholesterol. A staggering 50 percent of Americans have levels above the suggested limit.

Bariatric surgery, also known as weight loss surgery, has become increasingly popular in recent years to help the morbidly obese permanently reduce their weight. In the past decade the number of surgeries has increased more than 10-fold with about 220,000 surgeries taking place in the United States in 2008 alone.

Even if being over-weight does not kill you, chronic health problems and impaired mental fitness can still make life a misery, says a new study on women who are obese in middle age. Almost 80% of such women are more than likely to end up with multiple health problems by the time they are 70-years of age, as gaining weight in adulthood reduces the odds of healthy survival.

Three years ago I could hardly climb up a flight of stairs - with a body mass index of over 53 and a weight of over 27 stone (171kg) I had become virtually immobile due to morbid obesity.

The inability to lose weight and the realisation that obesity had ruined my life caused me to have an adjustable laparoscopic band surgical procedure early in 2007.

It’s 6 p.m. and you still have tons of e-mail to answer. You find yourself grabbing a bag of chips from the office vending machine and settling in for another hour or two — again.

Is there any wonder half of America’s employees haven’t exercised in the past 30 days and obesity levels are climbing?

Last year Edith Smith weighed in at over 300 lbs. and was on a wait list for gastric lap band surgery.

She has since had the procedure and now has dropped 50 lbs. in 10 months.

Edith says that she has learned a lot this past year and has worked hard to get where she is.

Losing about 10 percent of their body weight was enough to bring on total or near-total remission, said Gary Foster, head of the Center for Obesity Research and Education at Temple University in Philadelphia, and lead author of the study.