A new poll reveals more women worry about their weight than their overall physical health.

According to an Associated Press poll, half of women surveyed said they do not like their weight, versus just 33-percent who said they are concerned about their overall health.

According to a new study released on Friday, junk food commercials constitute an average of two-thirds of television food advertisements shown during hours children are most likely to be watching.

At the top of the list were Germany and the United States, whose junk food commercials made up some 90 percent of their televised food ads.  At the bottom were Britain and Australia with roughly 50 percent.

Researchers say they are urging government action to curb the amount of television marketing of this sort in an effort to combat youth obesity.

Unsafe levels of sodium chloride, or salt, in chain restaurant meals increase one's chance of developing hypertension, heart attacks, strokes, and kidney disease according to the Center for Science in the Public Interest. The nonprofit food safety and nutrition watchdog group today is exposing chain restaurant meals with dangerously high levels of sodium and is renewing its call on industry and government to lower sodium levels in foods.

The debate about whether the chicken or the egg came first has had some steep competition in recent years—what’s to blame for the obesity epidemic in America? Some experts say it’s genetics, some say environmental chemicals are to blame, others say it’s our slothful lifestyle filled with hours of television and video games. But Australian researchers say the rise in obesity is due almost entirely to overeating, and they have the numbers to prove it.

A state Senate ban on "bad fats" in restaurants grabbed headlines last week, but the bill was just one of Sen. Eliot Shapleigh's measures to stem obesity in Texas.

Shapleigh, D-El Paso, has shepherded two other bills through the Senate to improve access to fresh fruits and vegetables among lower income Texans and to get kids outside.

El Paso's share of obese children is twice the national average at 40 percent, and Texas as a whole ranks sixth in terms of states with overweight children.

A new procedure, called a ROSE procedure, is now available for patients who have had gastric bypass, lost weight and then slowly put weight back on again as their stomach pouch stretched. One of the problems with surgeries that reduce the size of the stomach for weight loss is that the pouch size may not be permanent. Over time, the pouch can enlarge to the point where meals of significant size can be eaten.

Missed satiety cues from infants linked to obesity

St. Louis, MO, As the childhood obesity epidemic in the United States continues, researchers are examining whether early parent and child behaviors contribute to the problem. A study from the Department of Nutritional Sciences, Rutgers University, published in the May/June 2009 issue of the Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior reports that mothers who miss signs of satiety in their infants tend to overfeed them, leading to excess weight gains during the 6 month to 1 year period.

Cindy Schreiner, 49, of Lynbrook, said she made it down the stairs of her lower Manhattan office building on Sept. 11, 2001, but was so overweight she couldn't run away when she reached the street. A colleague helped her into a garage.

Fern Fladell, 45, of Rockville Centre, said she once worried her knees would give out under her 260-pound weight.

Why are you overweight? Muffins and beer? Couch potato lifestyle? Too many carbs?

Well, none of the above, says Dr. Eric Braverman, author of several books including the new "Younger (Thinner) You Diet" (Rodale).

He is the author of the bestselling book, "Younger You" and director of the PATH Medical Center and PATH Foundation (pathmedical.com). He also is clinical assistant professor of neurological surgery at New York Presbyterian Hospital.

Bariatric surgery resolves type 2 diabetes mellitus in at least three quarters of obese patients within weeks of surgery, but a surgical alternative for the treatment of type 2 diabetes in nonobese people has yet to reach the clinic. Laparoscopic duodenojejunal bypass (LDJB) is emerging as a surgery that might ultimately prove to be a feasible treatment for diabetes. However, thus far, it has only been used in a handful of people, all in investigational settings. Marcos Berry, MD, a surgeon from the Bariatric Surgical Unit, Clinica las Condes in Santiago, Chile, presented promising results with the technique at the Society of American Gastrointestinal and Endoscopic Surgeons 2009 Annual Scientific Session and Postgraduate Course in Phoenix, Arizona.