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AbstractEspecially during the last decade populations of modern affluent societies are warned by scientist, politicians, media and interest groups that there is an obesity epidemic. Being overweight is now not only culturally condemned, but also medically and politically defined as a major public health threat. This article presents three lines of critique which is offered against this dominant public perception. Some argue that we need to change our attitude to fat irrespective of the medical truth. Others agree there is a problem, but they disagree with the analysis and therefore offer other solutions. Most fundamental is the kind of critique that starts with the question 'But is it true?'This question leads to three major conclusions. First, it turns out that the medical science is flawed, one‐sided and contradicted. Second, because there are no effective therapies, present policies produce major negative side‐effects. And third, these policies produce and legitimize discriminatory practices. A general conclusion which can be drawn from this critical literature is that the present risk discourse on fat has much more to do with social and cultural issues like power, blame and control than with health problems.

Responding to public fears and the loss of confidence in the aftermath of several food safety crises in the 1990s and 2000s, more and more regulatory laws have increasingly been affected by the precautionary principle. To clarify how those developments can have adverse consequences, we discuss two very different cases. First, at the molecular level we discuss the problems the system encounters by strictly applying the linear no-threshold (LNT) at low doses model, which was adopted in response to fears about the effects of ionizing radiations. Second, at a global scale, we discuss the problems associated with the precautionary regulation on Illegal, Unreported and Unregistered Fisheries that came into effect January 1, 2010. The technical aspects of food safety testing and their impacts are perhaps unknown to policy makers but they do dominate safety decisions. Both examples show that strict application of the precautionary principle produce deleterious side effects, which go against the very policy values that the precautionary regulation should protect. We show, in particular, that overly precautionary food safety regulation may harm food security. We conclude in the EU and other Western nations, problems of food security are much more relevant to human health and life expectancy than food safety. We recommend that current food safety regulation based on the precautionary risk-regulation reflex should normatively be re-evaluated with a complete regard for the values of food security – both within and outside the EU.