Patrick Cox: Gene Editing Could Simply and Cheaply Solve Obesity and Diabetes

Japan's pioneering regulatory reforms put this technology within reach.

by Patrick Cox
December 11, 2015

If you’re like me (and most Americans), you probably added a pound or two over the Thanksgiving holiday. Moreover, the high-calorie holiday season still has weeks to run, so it seems like a good time to talk about some of the solutions to that extra fat that afflicts so many of us.

The struggle to maintain a healthy body weight is not simply a matter of aesthetics. Body fat is associated with a variety of age-related diseases such as high blood pressure and adult-onset diabetes. These conditions significantly increase the risk of heart disease, stroke, kidney failure, cancer, blindness, and a plethora of other threats to health and life.

Two-thirds of Americans are considered overweight and one-third qualify as medically obese, so it should be no surprise that the weight-loss industry is worth $20 billion per year in the US alone. The closely related fitness industry is about the same size, and despite a record of high-profile failures, the growing weight-…