
French Chef
March 7, 2025Childhood Obesity and Nutrition
Feeding the Family
Michael Olson’s Food Chain Radio Show #1387
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Guest: Jill Troderman – Certified Holistic Nutritionist and Educator Author, The Food Tree

Michael Olson Food Chain Radio – The Food Tree with Jill Troderman
One in five children are obese, two in five adults are obese, and the rate at which we are becoming obese has doubled in 30 years.
There are costs to this obesity. Let’s add them up: There are the direct costs of medical care and treatment of obesity and health related conditions, including doctor visits, hospital stays, surgeries, medications and medical devices.
There are the costs of obesity related-diseases such as type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, hypertension, stroke, certain cancers and musculoskeletal disorders.
There are the out-of-pocket costs for prescription and off-the-shelf drugs. There are indirect costs, including the productivity losses from absenteeism, early retirement or disability, higher insurance premiums, increased workers compensation claims.
And there are social and economic costs, including lower wages, caregiver wages and the overall diminishment of one’s quality of life.
When added up in dollar terms, obesity is costing the United States of America $173 billion per year in direct medical costs alone.
This epidemic of obesity is totally out of our personal control. But what is not out of our control, is ourselves. And so today we pause to ask: What should we feed the family?
Leave a comment below: Which do you think is the worst food to feed children?
Michael Olson’s Three Laws of the Food Chain
#1 Agriculture is the foundation upon which we build all our sand castles.
#2 The farther we go from the source of our food, the less control we have over what’s in that food.
#3 Cheap food isn’t! READ MORE