Remember the book, French Women Don’t Get Fat? Sadly, things have changed. A new report shows 15.1 percent of France’s women are obese and another 26 percent are overweight. Researchers say the average French person has gained almost 7 pounds over the past 12 years, and part of the reason is a change in eating habits and more fast food restaurants in the country.

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Are healthy choices back-firing at some restaurants? A new report shows having healthy options at fast-food chains can make some diners eat less healthily than they would have otherwise. Researchers found 10-percent of customers ordered fries from menus that did not offer a salad as an option. But 33 percent ordered fries from menus that did include the choice of a salad.

I hardly ever go to fast food restaurants, but when I do – I’m glad to have healthy choices. How about you?

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Do you check calories at fast food restaurants before you order? Most people don’t. New research shows out of 4,311 people buying food at McDonalds, Burger King, Au Bon Pain, or Starbucks, only six looked at the nutrition information the restaurants have – that’s one-tenth of one percent. Researchers say the best way to get the information out is to post it somewhere really visible, like on menu boards.

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Remember the study a couple of months ago about how fast-food restaurants near schools could lead to fatter kids? Now another study seems to echo those results, saying a fast-food restaurant within about 500 feet of a school may lead to at least a five percent increase in the obesity rate at that school. Researchers from Columbia University and the University of California, Berkeley, say a ban on fast foods near schools could greatly reduce obesity rates among students.

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Does living near a lot of fast food restaurants increase your chances of having a stroke? New research from the University of Michigan finds the risk of stroke in a neighborhood increased by one percent for every fast-food restaurant in the area. Researchers say they don’t know whether the food itself actually increased the risk or whether fast-food restaurants are just more common in unhealthy neighborhoods.

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It makes a lot of sense – a new study from the University of California at Irvine finds kids who go to school within a half-mile of a fast-food restaurant are more likely to be overweight or obese than those whose schools are further away. And the research shows they also eat fewer servings of fruits and vegetables and drink more soda.

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I don’t see this happening anytime soon, but… A new study finds banning fast-food advertising on TV in the U.S. could reduce the number of overweight children by as much as 18 percent. But the report’s authors at the National Bureau of Economic Research question whether it would be practical to make this happen – so far, only Sweden, Norway and Finland have done this. To give you an idea of just how many unhealthy ads kids see, check out this report on advertisements for unhealthy foods during children’s programming.

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Burger King is cutting the amount of sodium in its kids meals. The fast food chain says it will now limit sodium to 600 milligrams or less in kids meals advertised to children under 12 years old. BK is also promoting menu combinations with less than 650 calories for adults.

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Here’s another reason to slow down when you eat. A new study from Japan finds people who eat quickly until they’re full are three times more likely to be overweight.

Researchers say the abundance of fast food makes the problem even worse. They highlight how eating styles, not just what or how much we eat can also contribute to the obesity epidemic. The study is in the British Medical Journal.

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