**Lecture addresses economic costs of obesity epidemic**

UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA — In the United States, two-thirds of American adults are reported to be overweight or obese. The physical costs of obesity are many — the risk of diabetes, hypertension and high cholesterol are increased greatly in obese individuals.

This obesity epidemic has economic costs as well. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, upward of $210 billion were spent on health care costs related to obesity in 2008 alone.

Laurian J. Unnevehr, an economic researcher for the U.S. Department of Agriculture, addressed the price tag of obesity in America as well as the costs of preventing obesity through public policy in a lecture Friday on the University of Minnesota’s St. Paul campus.

Unnevehr’s best practices are not the only efforts by the government to reduce the rate of obesity in the U.S. First lady Michelle Obama recently became an advocate for healthy living through her “Let’s Move” initiative, which aims to slow the rising rate of childhood obesity by encouraging children to stay active and make healthy choices when it comes to food.

—Minnesota Daily
By Emily Mongan

**Patches, gum might prove ineffective in nixing nicotine habit**

OHIO UNIVERSITY — Students hooked to satisfying their nicotine addictions with a cigarette might be out of luck when it comes to putting their habit to bed for good.

Although nicotine-replacement therapies such as nicotine gum and patches can provide a temporary fix, they might not deliver a long-term solution.

Roger Barnhouse, a pharmacist at Campus Care, said smokers utilizing nicotine-replacement therapies tend to relapse rather than kicking the habit.

“Nicotine is one of the most addictive drugs known to man,” Barnhouse said.
Additionally, Barnhouse said many smokers risk becoming addicted to the replacement therapies themselves.

“The problem with the patches and the gum, the long-term effect, is the person becomes addicted to the patches and the gum rather than the cigarettes.”

James Gaskell, health commissioner at the Athens City-County Health Department, said a common scenario is that smokers have initial luck with nicotine replacements but relapse by the end of the year.

“I think that whatever drugs are used also need to be used with what we call cognitive therapy,” Gaskell said.

—The Post
By Sarah Grothjan

**Desegregation icon Bridges talks with Moody-Adams**

COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY — Ruby Bridges, an icon of the desegregation of schools in the 1960s South, told a packed room on Wednesday evening that she believes that racism today is worse than it’s ever been.

Bridges was interviewed by former Columbia College Dean Michele Moody-Adams in only her second public campus appearance since she stepped down as dean in August and by U.N. Research Specialist Gabrielle Apollon, CC ’09, in Barnard’s Diana Oval.

Bridges, the first African-American student to go to a desegregated school in the South, spoke about her life story and her optimistic philosophies. “Racism is a grown-up disease,” she said. “Each and every one of our babies come into the world with a clean heart. … We have got to come together if we are going to make our world a better place.”

Bridges said she didn’t really have a say in attending the school, because “in black families, you didn’t say ‘no.’”

For Bridges, her lifelong philosophy comes from Martin Luther King, Jr.: “We are never to look at a person and judge them by the color of their skin,” she said.

—Columbia Spectator
By Margaret Mattes