European GPs know that they are facing an obesity epidemic but do not know what to do about it, a debate on obesity heard last week. “European trends in obesity are now in parallel with [those in] the United States,” Christian Fabian, president of the European Union of General Practitioners and a GP in Sweden told the meeting. The debate was organised by the UK company Medical Futures, with a panel of obesity experts and delegates from the union.

Susan Jebb, head of nutrition and health research at the Medical Research Council in Cambridge, …