Obesity surgery triples among U.S. teens

Child abuse, without doubt. And it doesn't come cheap.

"About 5 percent of children and adults had major complications, mostly respiratory problems. Children spent an average of about 3.2 days in the hospital in 2003, versus 3.5 days for adults. Total hospital charges also were lower for pediatric patients, $30,804 per patient versus $36,056 for adults."

In addition to the abuse, this is almost always an unnecessary procedure.

Since failed dieting is a prerequisite for bariatric surgery, and since almost all diets are designed to fail, no child or adult is given a real opportunity to avoid the knife.

"He had struggled with his weight since he was 11, and said he had tried just about every diet, but nothing worked."

"Everything" except taking in fewer Calories than he burned. That works 100% of the time.