"Spinach tastes like Wolf Blitzer's beard dipped in a salad," says potential scurvy-haver Anderson Cooper. He knows that because he ate a vegetable once.

Previously - Anderson Cooper, eat your vegetables!

This weekend on "Sanjay Gupta MD," Dr. Gupta takes a critical look at sugar and the impact it has on our bodies. Don't miss the in-depth investigation Saturday at 4:30 p.m. ET, and Sunday at 7:30 a.m. ET on CNN.

Pushing her meal cart into the hospital room, a research assistant hands out tall glasses of reddish-pink liquid, along with a gentle warning: "Remember, you guys have to finish all your Kool-Aid."
FULL POST

Editor's note: This is the fifth story in CNN's series exploring the issues surrounding childhood obesity.

It's a sweet, sticky, crunchy, ooey-gooey, chocolate-drizzled, cheese-stuffed, deep-fried world out there, and we can't pretend it doesn't tastes pretty darned delicious. Nearly from birth, American kids are blasted with ads for foods that send their taste buds into overdrive, but don't do them any nutritional favors.

These treats might be okay in very careful moderation, but if it's hard enough for adults to resist the sugary, salty siren call, how can we expect kids to do so? A parent needs an arsenal. Grab your knives.
FULL POST

Have you ever stood near the checkout of a grocery store and stared at the rack of chocolate bars, debating whether anyone would judge you for buying the king-size?

You know the regular size is enough to satisfy your craving, but the bigger candy bar is only 40 cents more and it just... Looks. So. Good.

Worry no more – Mars, Inc. is going taking that decision out of your hands. The company that produces M&Ms, 3 Musketeers, Snickers and Twix bars has vowed to stop shipping any Mars chocolate products that exceed 250 calories per portion by the end of 2013.

Read - Mars puts Snickers bars on a diet

How many times have you been to the movie theater, ordered a regular-sized popcorn or soda and been asked, “Would you like a large for a quarter more?” What about ordering a sandwich at your local deli? "Make it a combo!" you probably say.

We’re trained early on, oftentimes by our parents, to clean our plates or no dessert. Frequently, regardless of how hungry we are, that’s exactly what we’ll do.

Sure, the medium-sized popcorn would’ve been entirely satisfying, but if offered the larger portion, we’re going to take it and eat it – all of it.
FULL POST

Editor's note: Laura Schmidt and her colleagues, Robert Lustig and Claire Brindis, are the authors of "The toxic truth about sugar." To read the full commentary, visit the science journal Nature.

I am a medical sociologist, which means I study the health of whole societies. I've spent more than 20 years studying the best possible ways to address alcohol problems in societies - what works and what doesn't to protect people from harm.

I work as a professor in the University of California, San Francisco School of Medicine and at the UCSF Clinical and Translational Science Institute. This allows me to connect with other scientists who come from very different backgrounds but who want to work together on big problems - think of a Manhattan Project, only one focused on protecting health through the collaboration of scientists who study everything from tiny cells to entire societies.

So three years ago, a pediatric endocrinologist named Rob Lustig walks into my office and asks for my help. Rob tells me that he's finding many connections between the metabolism of fructose (sugar) and ethanol (alcohol) in his work on metabolic functioning, liver damage and the obesity epidemic.

Read the full story - Opinion: Why we should regulate sugar like alcohol

School meals will have to offer fruits and vegetables to students every day under standards issued by the United States Department of Agriculture on Wednesday.

The meal programs, which feed about 32 million students in public and private schools, will have to reduce sodium, saturated fat and trans fats. Schools must also offer more whole grains as well as fat-free or low-fat milk varieties.

These standards go into effect July 1 and will be phased in over a three-year period, according to the USDA.

The new nutrition standards are largely based on recommendations by the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies, as part of efforts to curb childhood obesity. Recent numbers show that about 17% of children in the United States are obese.

Read the full story: "USDA issues new rules for school meals"

The idea of a well-rounded school lunch may skip the "wellness" factor and skip straight to the "rounded" - in the form of pizza.

Congress unveiled its latest short-term $182 billion spending bill late Monday, which among the legislation, would deny funding to the new - and healthier - school meal nutrition standards the Department of Agriculture proposed earlier this year amid growing concerns of childhood obesity.

The new USDA standards included increasing the availability of fruits, vegetables, whole grains and low-fat milk while decreasing the amount of sodium, saturated fat and starchy potatoes.
FULL POST

FoodCorps is sending passionate, dedicated service members to American communities hoping to revolutionize the way we eat.

Many of us have heard the statistics - about one-third of American adults and approximately 17% (or 12.5 million) of children and adolescents aged 2 to 19 years are obese. One in seven low-income, preschool-aged children are also considered as such.

These numbers can be overwhelming, and when faced with a stagnating economy, high unemployment and a deeply divided Congress, it’s hard to see a solution.

But in 2009, when President Obama signed the Kennedy Serve America Act into law, expanding the AmeriCorps program, one group of people saw the opportunity for change.
FULL POST

Hold that cheeseburger.

Across the pond in Europe, Denmark is becoming the first country in the world to impose a so-called fat tax on foods high in saturated fats.

That includes everything from cheeseburgers and pizza to butter, milk, cheese and oils. Many Danes stocked up on these yummy groceries before the tax went into effect his weekend.

How much the "fat tax" is depends on how much saturated fat is in any given food, but it comes out to about $3 for every 2 pounds of saturated fat.

Read Should there be a tax on foods high in saturated fats? at The Cafferty Files