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"Imagine that you notice that a close friend of yours has gained some weight. Let&amp;#x27;s say, for discussion purposes, that it&amp;#x27;s a significant amount of weight--say 20 pounds in the period of a few months. Does this give you the license to speak up and voice your concern to her? One prominent doctor says you should, but could you? The Diet Blog pointed out recently that a prominent physician in England is advising women to tell their friends when they&amp;#x27;ve noticed that they&amp;#x27;ve packed on pounds--in the name of health. The bloggers there take a bit of controversial stance, saying that they believe this approach makes some sense. They quote Dr. David Haslam, chairman and director of the National Obesity Forum in the UK: &amp;quot;We can no longer afford to be polite about obesity as it is clearly a matter of health and not vanity... As the nation gets bigger, it is becoming increasingly hard to gauge our own size and our perception of &amp;quot;the right size&amp;quot; is clearly stilted.&amp;quot; According to a study in the UK, every woman has at least two friends she thinks are overweight, and only a quarter had said anything about it. Of those who did, 12 percent said their friend was &amp;quot;devastated,&amp;quot; and 10 percent said the friend &amp;quot;burst into tears.&amp;quot; Yikes! While I agree that helping friends live healthy lifestyles and making suggestions that could benefit their health is a good thing, I don&amp;#x27;t think we need to introduce any more criticism into female relationships. If you&amp;#x27;re truly worried about a pal&amp;#x27;s weight, instead of telling her &amp;quot;boy, you&amp;#x27;ve gained a few,&amp;quot; maybe invite her to join you for your Saturday morning jog in a way that doesn&amp;#x27;t shame her, like &amp;quot;I could really use a running partner--would you be up for joining me on Saturday mornings?&amp;quot; Thoughts on this? P.S. Speaking of friends--is there an old friendship that hurt you that you are tempted to rekindle? Don&amp;#x27;t. The shocking fast food experiment you have to read about! And, should too-skinny celeb photos in the media come with health warning labels? More Ways to Get Glamour Visit Shopglamour.com for cute stuff starting at just $10! Enter the latest Glamour sweepstakes! Follow us on Twitter Add us to your iGoogle homepage Photo: iStock"^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.glamour.com/health-fitness/blogs/vitamin-g/2010/04/health-controversy-one-doctor>