The dramatically increasing prevalence of obesity, associated with potentially life-
threatening health problems, including cardiovascular diseases and type II diabetes, poses
an enormous public health problem. It has been proposed that the obesity epidemic can be
explained by the concept of 'food addiction'. In this review we focus on possible similarities
between binge eating disorder (BED), which is highly prevalent in the obese population, and
drug addiction. Indeed, both behavioral and neural similarities between addiction and BED …