Stranded at home amid pandemic lockdowns in spring 2020, Emma Warford stumbled down a social media rabbit hole in her quest to get in shape. Viral 28-day fitness challenges. YouTubers promising “hourglass abs.” Diet videos where slim-stomached influencers peddled calorie-tracking apps.
Warford, then a 15-year-old starting volleyball player, bought a food scale and began replacing meals with energy drinks hawked by social media stars.
Soon, her calorie cutting became a compulsion. The thought of eating cake for her 16th birthday induced severe anxiety. By season’s end, she began volleyball games benched, too feeble to start. A year into the pandemic, her heart rate slowed and she was rushed to the hospital.
Stories like Warford’s are why lawmakers in Colorado, California, Texas, New York and elsewhere are taking big, legislative swings at the eating disorder crisis. On Thursday, Colorado lawmakers advanced a bill that would create a state Office of Disordered Eating Prevention, intended in part to patch holes in care, to fund research and to raise awareness.
The bill passed committee by a 6-3 vote with Republicans demurring, partly concerned with the creation of a new government office and skeptical of its efficacy.
Warford, who’s now in recovery after two years of treatment, is among nearly 30 million Americans — about the population of Texas — who will struggle with an eating disorder in their lifetime. Every year over 10,000 die from an eating disorder, according to data cited by the National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders.
BARIATRIC SURGERY PATIENTS LIVE LONGER BUT FACE A HIGHER SUICIDE RISK, SAYS STUDY
Proposals across the U.S. include restricting social media algorithms from promoting potentially harmful content; prohibiting the sale of weight loss pills to minors; and adding eating disorder prevention to middle and high school curriculums.
The slew of legislation follows a spike in eating disorder cases as pandemic lockdowns…
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