What Do Colds Have to Do With Obesity?

Not much. It's silly season again with all the reports that a viral infection may make some fat cells fatter. Some journalists--or their editors--apparently couldn't resist headlines that suggest that you can "catch obesity." No doubt visions of anti-fat vaccines are dancing in their heads.

Here's a clunker, by Roger Highfield, Science Editor of the U.K.'s Telegraph: "Being Fat May Be Catching, A New Study Says."

No. If you sit down next to a fat person you are not going to get fat. If you eat a fat person's diet, however, you might. Or if you sit down and never get up to run, jump or play.

At any rate, whenever you read or hear or see a story like this, you're first question should be "What's the evidence?" And then your second question should be "How good is the evidence?"

Believe it or not, you can tell a lot about scientific evidence based on where it's found--whether in a peer-reviewed journal (no guarantees there either, of course) or at a poster session at a scientific conference, as in fact this latest research was.

Poster sessions are like gossip fests among scientists. It's a chance for them to say, "Hey look at this neat thing I think I found. What do you think?" They're sort of like trial balloons--easily shot down.

As for me, I know that watching what I eat and getting plenty of exercise is the only thing that keeps the pounds off. Sigh.