In October of 2007, the Reality Coalition held a one-day symposium at the National Academy of Science/Institute of Medicine entitled “Making Weight Loss Everybody’s Business.” The meeting focused on the role of corporate America in addressing the issue of obesity and overweight in the workforce. The symposium addressed broad policy issues as well as specific strategies being implemented by The Mayo Clinic and Hannaford Brothers.

This symposium also allowed the Reality Coalition to take a leadership role by filling a void that had not previously been addressed by any of the existing obesity coalitions through the creation of a forum for leaders from business, government, academia, health care and non-profit organizations to address this important topic.

One of the key conclusions emerging from the IOM symposium was that while corporations are acutely aware of the health risks associated obesity and the role of obesity in increasing health care costs in an unsustainable manner, a major obstacle to implementing health and wellness programs in the workplace is the lack of knowledge about effective strategies to deal with this problem and a lack of data to justify investment in weight management programs. In other words, there is a need amongst employers to be able to distinguish “help” from “hype”.

In the absence of strong evidence, employers are adopting a variety approaches in the hope that these efforts will have a measurable effect on lowering health care costs.

In October of 2008, the Reality Coalition built upon the momentum created by the IOM Symposium by continuing to provide leadership and a forum for corporations and obesity treatment providers and researchers to explore effective solutions to addressing obesity in the workforce. This was achieved a Symposium, held on October 4th in conjunction with the Obesity Society Annual Meeting in Phoenix, followed shortly thereafter by the legislative hearing in Milpitas, CA.

The 2008 program targeted leaders from the business community and provided a more detailed focus on what is known about the causes and consequences of obesity and overweight, effective approaches to prevention and treatment and current strategies being adopted by employers to address this issue and to evaluate the outcomes of such strategies.