Confronting myths about household food insecurity and excess weight

The article of Schlussel et al. makes a valuable contribution by clarifying how household food insecurity (HFI) is differentially associated with obesity over the life course in females. Although HFI was not associated with obesity in Brazilian children, it was associated in female adolescents and adults. Further research to reveal why HFI is differentially associated with obesity across the life course would be helpful in understand-ing how best to prevent obesity in food-insecure households.The association between HFI and obesity has been discussed since at least 1995, and this as-sociation has been labeled a “paradox”. This label resulted from the limited knowledge in the 1990s of the causes, mechanisms, and consequences of HFI. The prevailing conceptual framework for HFI then was that poverty could result in HFI, which in turn leads to poor dietary quality and quantity, undernutrition, and poor health