If just standing more and sitting less can add years to life and life to years, then we owe a lot of ill health to the seats of our pants. The solution is for us each to incorporate strategies into our daily routines that allow us to get up and move about -- at least a little, at least intermittently.

You fold a tiny raisin into your hand, perhaps thinking about the journey it made to reach you, farmers planting seeds, nature providing water. You squeeze the creases of the aged, dried grape, maybe feeling the wrinkles as the hands that picked the ripened fruit had done.

Earlier this month, the European Safety Alliance released Child Safety Report Cards for 31 countries -- and here in the U.S., we would do well to learn from this far-reaching, comprehensive thinking.

Significantly reducing sugar-sweetened beverage consumption is a key component in solving America's obesity crisis.

The best defenses of the human body reside largely, and often inextricably, with the body politic. Public health is for the public -- and is best advanced by the collective efforts of the public.

I define the Tin Man effect simply with the old expression "Move it or lose it." In this case, the less you move physically, the more you lose in health.

I was privileged and honored to deliver the keynote address recently at a local high school graduation. My marching orders were to deliver a generally inspiring exhortation on being selfless and giving back in seven minutes or less.

If the international community chooses to seize this moment to promote a new distribution of opportunity -- one that empowers people to challenge and overcome injustice -- we can unleash the potential of individuals and society as a whole to live in health, dignity and justice.

By committing to including health as a component of policies and programs, these federal agencies are setting an example for all sectors by recognizing how their policies and programs contribute to the nation's health and wellness.

The lore and the legend of the horse whisperer honors a whisper heard, not spoken. That all of us could learn to hear and understand horses better might matter to some more than others. That we might all learn to hear and understand one another better matters to us all.

While obesity is traditionally considered a public health and medical issue, the rapid increase in the national prevalence of obesity and overweight is affecting America's ability to defend itself militarily and perform competitively in business.

We can make health a prevailing cultural meme by replacing our unconscious adaptations with conscious choices. It's true, we are adapted to like sweet. But we are also adapted to be terrestrial -- yet can learn to swim, and to hold our breath under water.

If we want to get serious about fighting obesity, public health researchers would like us to understand, we need to look at the social dynamics that drive our bad health behaviors. And the most powerful driver of that unhealthy behavior? That would be inequality.

Given the health consequences and enormous cost of our country's obesity epidemic, it is time to return eating less. And banning the large sizes of unhealthy sugar-sweetened beverages is a good place to begin.

Bud Clayman, the subject of a new movie about thriving with and despite mental illness, has given us a message of hope. But for those that look beyond Bud and his family, we are left with the inescapable task of making what was possible for him possible for everyone so afflicted.