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OBESITY

New ‘fat’ gene to help in fight against obesity

Scientists working in Spain, the US, and Canada have identified a 'fat gene' they say could play a key role in the fight against global obesity.

New 'fat' gene to help in fight against obesity
One in six Spaniards is obese, according to OECD figures from 2012. Photo: Shutterstock.

Previous studies have shown that a gene called FTO is vital in the development of obesity, a major worldwide health problem.

Now scientists have found a new piece of the puzzle. Rats with the so-called IRX3 gene don't get as fat when eating junk food, a study just published in the science journal Nature shows.

"Our data strongly suggest IRX3 controls body mass and regulates body composition," said study author Marcelo Nóbrega. 

"Any association between FTO and obesity appears due to the influence of IRX3," he added.

In their study, the researchers found that rats with the IRX3 gene had 25 to 30 percent less fat because of a loss of white fat and increased metabolic activity. The same link was also found in humans and zebrafish.

The researchers including a member of Seville's CABD research centre believe the new discovery could help in the development of drugs to fight obesity and diabetes.   

Global rates of obesity, or a body mass index of 30 or more, have nearly doubled since 1980, according to the World Health Organization. Some 1.4 billion adults were affected in 2008.

Obesity can lead to cardiovascular problems, diabetes, arthritis, and some cancers. 

Spain is the thirteenth most obese country in the world according to the WHO while an OECD update in 2012 reported one in six Spanish adults were obese.

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TRAVEL

German beach hotel bans overweight guests

A hotel on Germany’s North Sea coast has banned overweight guests due to worries they’ll break the resorts ‘elegant designer furniture’.

German beach hotel bans overweight guests
The beach in Cruxhaven, near the Beachhotel Sahlenburg. Photo: DPA

The Beachhotel Sahlenburg in the German city of Cuxhaven is hoping to welcome everyone back to the beach after the coronavirus lockdown ends, however not everyone is welcome on the sand. 

In order to stay at the hotel, you need to be 130 kilograms (286) pounds or below. 

“For reasons of liability, we would like to point out that the interior is not suitable for people with a body weight of more than 130 kg,” says the hotel. 

The reason for the restriction? The hotels elegant design furniture is far too sensitive and cannot support the weight of anyone upwards of 130kg. 

Hotel Operator Angelika Hargesheimer, speaking with German media outlet Buten and Binnen, says her hotel’s classic furniture is not made for big butts. 

“The designer chairs downstairs, they’re real classics. When a person over 130 kilograms sits on it, they sit there with one buttock and the chair does not last long.”

“But I want to have a designer hotel and I want to have nice furniture – not brutal furniture made of oak.”

Once bitten? 

Hargesheimer says she won’t get fooled again when it comes to chubby guests, saying that a larger visitor broke one of her hotel beds previously – which was the moment she decided to bite the bullet. 

She also said that the design of the chairs make them uncomfortable for larger people, while the showers are too small for the big boned. 

Although there were some suggestions that the move was illegal, a legal expert interviewed by Bild said that it would only amount to discrimination if the guests were so obese that they were considered to be disabled. 

“Only if an obese person reaches the threshold of a disability does protection against discrimination exist. Therefore, it should be difficult for those affected to take legal action against provisions such as in the hotel described, with reference to the AGG (General Treatment Act),” Sebastian Bickerich, from the Federal Anti-Discrimination Office, told Bild

 

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