Climate change and the obesity epidemic have become the defining problems of our generation. To be able to confront the challenges of both the obesity epidemic and climate change attention must be given, not only at the local level, but also at the international level. Internationally, both of these are becoming a problem. Changes to the physical and social environments implemented by public health officials can provide interventions in coordination with governmental partners to help in both aspects. Both of these current problems must be addressed through public health interventions such as education, transportation and agriculture, and not clinically due to the limitations of population impacts that clinical interventions will have. Much like greenhouse gas emissions, that come from the activities and decisions of individual people and organizations operating at the local, regional, national, and international levels, obesity can be seen as a problem experienced at all of these levels as well (Bulkeley & Kern, 2006). Some people can argue that both problems are a sign of economic success. There are more greenhouse gases because more products have to be made for more profit to be made. This is also true of obesity. Obesity can ultimately be …show more content…
Changing the behaviors of individuals is difficult. A coordinated strategy that involves policy interventions that make healthy dietary and activity choices easier are what is necessary to achieve benefits (Frieden, Dietz, & Collins, 2010). It is difficult to have broad societal change and so education, transportation and agriculture changes are necessary. First it is important to alter relative food prices, then to shift the exposure of food from energy packed to lower energy foods, and finally improving the image of healthy food while making unhealthy food less attractive (Frieden, Dietz, & Collins,