The total cost of obesity for the State of Vermont, its employers, and private citizens is estimated to be over $615 million per year. Obesity is now rapidly approaching tobacco addiction as the leading preventable public health problem facing Vermonters. We discuss what has caused the rapid rise of obesity in this country with Dr. Bob McLellan, the Section Chief of Occupational and Environmental Medicine at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center. And we look at what can be done to reverse the trend.
You can post your questions or comments below or email them to Vermontedition@vpr.net.
Plus, VPR’s Bob Kinzel explains what part of Governor-elect Peter Shumlin’s new staff has been named and what positions are still vacant.
And, the official portrait of outgoing governor Jim Douglas is set to be unveiled. Earlier this summer Vermont Edition interviewed Middlebury artist Kate Gridley, who was commissioned to paint it. We hear how the governor and the artist worked together to create an image that encompasses Douglas’s passions and personality.
Governor Douglas’s official portrait will be unveiled at the state house in Montpelier on Wednesday afternoon, December 1 and at Middlebury’s Town Hall Theater at 6:00pm. In Middlebury, Governor Douglas and artist Kate Gridley will be on hand to talk about the painting’s creation.