I was flipping channels tonight during dinner when I came across the latest reality show which features a family of ‘plus sized’ people trying to lose weight for their health (just to give you an example the 14 yr old son weighs 300 lbs and is the slimmest family member).

Aside from shaking my head at these kinds of shows I was also reminded of one of the topics on local radio the past few days, the fact that on Friday a new law will take effect in California which bans restaurants from using trans fats. For all of the wailing from some of the callers the impact is likely to be minimal since most places, especially most fast food places, have already switched.

But some callers also debated the merits and enforcability of such a law. They pointed out that for a 150 lb guy who eats a burger once in a while having a Big Mac is not really much of a health risk while for a 300 lb one eating a couple of french fries could trigger a blowout.

These same callers pointed out that in bars there is already a policy that if a person has had too much to drink they can be cut off so why not a similar policy in food places ?

If someone seems of decent weight they can order, if someone is overweight then they are limited. Other suggested that a scaling tax be assigned to pay for the future medical costs. While obviously all of this speculation is not going to work into actual laws or policies, I thought it might be fun for us to discuss.

So how would you protect us from ourselves ?