It depends upon the circumstances. In poor communities, there is a higher rate of obesity due to the fact that people do not have enough money for healthy (and more expensive) food, gym memberships, dieticians (which are often not covered by health insurance), and so on. In a case like this, you can't blame the parents, they're probably doing the best they can. Also, if the parents have lived unhealthy lives, they probably don't know how to stay in shape with nutritous food and regular exercise, and unintentionally have a bad influence on the kids. In this case, the parents are not totally at fault.

However, there is a line that can be crossed. Once a child starts getting morbidly obese, 300+ pounds, then there is just no excuse. It's one thing to be in a situation that makes it difficult to keep physically fit, but it's another when you're letting a kid eat him/herself to death.

There is no excuse for the parent(s) contributing to this morbidly obese child! Even in poor communities, healthy eating is still possible. There are many avenues available for poor people to obtain healthy food at little or no cost.

I am a parent of an obese child. I never allowed sweets, I spent a large percentage of my life preparing healthy food, fast food was not an option. I did everything that I could to help my daughter. It was horrible the way that people judged me and tried to give me diet advice while their kids had fast food for dinner three or more days a week and endless sweets but were still thin. My University of Michigan doctor kept sending me to dieticians, which I went despite my complaints that there was something more serious than bad diet. It wasn't until my daughter was 12 years old that her thyroid disease showed up on blood tests that were taken by the Medical Weight Loss Center.

Be careful all you people out there that are passing blind judgement on parents of obese children. Our environment is not the same as it was when we were children. There are hormones and other additives in the food that we assume are healthy that are changing our metabolisms, possibly invitro, and not every child or person is as prone to problems with these chemicals as others. To make matters worse, children can't play outside like we did because the percentage of crimes against children are increasing.

Obesity is a sometime a result of an underlying disease. Are you judging parents of diabetic children? Autistic children?

The question here is about this particular mother and her particular 555 pound child. If a child is 550 pounds, there is definitely something wrong, both physically with the child, and mentally with the mother. If she didn't take action when her son hit, say, 250 pounds, she was absolutely neglecting the physical health and safety of her child. Kids do not become supermorbidly obese on their own -- someone is feeding them, and feeding them A LOT. It takes 3500 EXTRA calories to gain a pound of fat in an otherwise healthy child, and a large fraction of that in metabolically compromised children.

There's a huge difference between an overweight/obese child who is otherwise healthy, and a supermorbidly obese 555 pound teenager. Where the line is I don't know, but it's definitely somewhere between those two.

And Lisa, if your daughter was strictly following a healthy diet and she was obese, the *first* thing any doctor should test for is thyroid. A bone test can show when your daughter's thyroid problem began -- and if your pediatrician missed this extraordinarily obvious problem, you would be right in taking him or her to task for it.

Something else to keep in mind is that it is perfectly fine to use federal food assistance money to buy junk food. In fact, given dire straights folks are in and the fact they are using it to buy all their food instead of just as a supplement, people are forced to buy this high calorie, low nutrition garbage to feed their kids. Not to mention the fact that a lot of poor neighborhoods don't have a grocery store and folks shop at the 7-100 equivalent. It's not wonder the working poor are more afflicted with obesity.

Yes, there needs to be education on nutrition, but there also needs to be a way for parents to get nurtitious food. And perhaps we need to look at food stamps as an 'item' rather than money supplement.

Anyway, not defending the parents by a long shot, because you can eat nutritious on assistance, it just requires more effort. And I am willing to agree that things are happening to change metabolism, and it's one more reason to avoid processed foods.

It depends.  Again, look at the circumstances. Some children may have medical reasons for the obesity or maybe they take medication that causes weight gain... or the child could have an eating disorder... None of those things can be blamed on the parents (UNLESS the parents are not working with a doctor to address them). There are many things to be considered so people should not be so quick to judge..

Yes, it depends.

In this case, however, 555 lbs doesn't happen by accident.

"It Takes a Village' to raise a child! Yes it is "fair"to accuse the parents of neglect, they buy the food, and we all pay the doctor bill. It is "moral" if this accusation motivates the parents to seek help. At 250 lbs this child probably had heighbors. If you want me to cast blame and charge neglect i need more facts!!

There's no way that this happened overnight, and even if all this kid ate was fast food, he never got any exercise either. I struggled with weight in high school (never like this kid), and it took my mother changing the things we cooked at home to really start me on a better path. I can sympathize that working parents don't have the time to cook healthy meals all the time, but she could've prepared stuff in advance or taught her son how to cook simple dishes when she couldn't be home. In this case, his mother just didn't seem to care, and that's sad. I hope this boy never has any life-threatening issues because of this.

My daughter is 8 and this year all of a sudden just became chubby. People started commenting on it right away. First I took her to the doctor that checked for Diabetes, Thyroid etc. Everything came back fine. I've cut out most snacks, In the winter it was hard but since spring and summer are here I put her in a very expensive camp that I can barely afford where they exercise all day, I take her swimming almost every night and weekend. She is barely ever in the house watching tv anymore. She is still a little chubby but now I know she is healthy and maybe whatever it is is just the beginning of puberty but we will have to see. It does creap up on you quickly but I think parents have to notice it and take action right away. Letting it go is what gets these really big children in the position they are in.

I had asthma as a child and could not be as active as other children becuase I could not breathe and becuase of my medications that I was on to control my asthma. But my parents did what they could by making sure that I got exersize (swimming, hiking, water & downhill skiing, biking) while learning when to stop so I did not have an attack. They also made sure that I ate healthy foods and they knew how to say "no" to all of the junk food I wanted to eat. I also never spent tons of time infront of the TV - if I was too sick to go out side, I would be sitting quitely reading. So in some cases, having a child that is heavy or overweight is not the parent's problem, as long as the parent is TRYING to help the kids. Many kids though are having troubles with weight BECAUSE THE PARENTS are NOT TRYING to set a good example and letting the kids sit & play video games all day.

i dont live far from where the 555lb kid is from and i have followed this pretty close.i dont think this would have ever been an issue if the mother had not been on food stamps.i see fat kids everyday and the family aint on food stamps so wheres the police for these people.bottom line is humans have to have someone who is beneath them and exploit them to make ourselves feel like were better than someone else,and in this case it was the mother of a kid who HAS a problem wheather it is mental or physical HE has a problem.but as almost always socioty in order to fill its crown fingers the weak or minority so lets cut the bull.how many of you out there who are so hell bent on lynching this woman would deny your child food if they were hungry.then where would the line be between not feeding your child and over feeding him or her.i am sure this lady saw the obvious and tried what she could but was probaly faced with decisions that there were no right awnsers only good or bad at the time.for someone to blame someonelse for the apperance of another is in our nature and only relays the ignorance of midevil aptitude.you dont blame the parents of a child who is born with a learning disability?no.you help the kid how about the parents of an anerexic teen.people all have diffrent bodies thats why the world goes round people metabolisims are all diffrent and this is very evident in this case.and instead of helping this poor kid people like all you judges out there have made his life a lot worse by putting his mother on the chopping block now how do you think he feels?

Last time I checked, healthy food is actually cheaper than expernsive food.

$1 dollar for a bunch of bananas. $3 for a bag of chips.

$4 dollars for an entire chicken. $3 dollars for veg = $7 dollars for an entire family.

$5 minimum per person for fast food.

These people should definately be charged with neglect. Every lie you people come up with to excuse their behavior is just that, a lie. Junk food is more expensive than healthy food. Most thyroid problems and diabetes are caused by being overweight, not vice-versa. Don't try to excuse their cruelty, selfishness, stupidity and neglect.

This is one of the reasons that we are currently in a healthcare crisis. If parents continue to neglect their child and let them become obese, health insurance will not be affordable to anyone!! Children are obese because parents are lazy!! Part of being a good parent it providing healthy choices and encouraging children to exercise.

Eatting that many calories to become over 500 pounds and maintain that weight would take a lot of money for food!

Cut the twinkies and ding dongs, buy a bag of frozen veggies.

Cut the junkie cereals and buy a large container of oatmeal which is cheaper and healthier.

Cut the fatty fried foods chips and sodas and drink water, eat fruits, eggs are cheap..and get off the couch and excercise!

Learn not to eat until you are full! Too many calories go to your waist because you will not burn them off!

As a parent it is your responsibility to teach your child!

Parents buy the food not the kids! It is the parents fault if they neglect their responsibilities! I really feel sorry for this kid!

Childhood obesity wasn't a significant problem until fairly recently because kids used to walk to school and spend their afternoons, weekends and summers PLAYING OUTDOORS. Today, THAT might get you charged with child neglect in many communities, even very safe ones, because of the one in a million chance that your kid could be kidnapped or otherwise harmed. I live in the inner city and always let my kids play freely; ironically, I know many suburban parents who think that's horrible. But hey, they aren't fat, nor are they wusses! When 66% of Americans are overweight, there's obviously something drastically wrong with our whole society, and blaming parents is a cruel, generally racist copout for a society-wide problem. I used to work for a child protective services agency, BTW. There are many neurotic, personal-agenda-driven people working in such places and when they remove kids needlessly, the kids are the ones who suffer. Some even end up dead in foster care. Please don't give these heartless bureaucrats yet more ammunition to use against the poor.

Addiction and compulsive behavior is an illness and treatment for such would be priority one if we could reform this Health Care Nightmare....?

A child being 555 lbs at age 14 is abominable. There is absolutely no excuse for it. I needed public assistance to help with food when my child was born (I had lost my job because of the FMLA laws) and I was able to buy healthy food. I acknowledge and agree that there are medical conditions that can cause weight gain, but not to the extent of 555 lbs. This child obviously suffers from an eating disorder (considering the mother claimed she saw the child hiding food). This, like any other condition or addiction can and has to be treated and it can be done for free.

If food is an issue for you or anyone you know, you can go to:

www.oa.org for help.