Who is to blame for the overabundance of anorexic models on the catwalk? “Not the fashion industry,� says Gisele Bundchen.

Apparently basing her opinion on her own experience, Gisele said that “parents are responsible� for anorexia.

How did she come to this conclusion? She did not have to deal with an eating disorder because she had good family support.

Family support is obviously important in any situation, but that claim did not go well with a number of experts.

“An uninformed opinion such as Bundchen’s causes harm on a number of levels. By contributing to the stigma, it drives sufferers underground and creates obstacles to seeking help.

It damages attempts at advocacy and hurts parents who are desperately fighting for their child’s recovery,” said Allan S. Kaplan, M.D., Loretta Anne Rogers Chair in Eating Disorders at the University of Toronto.

“We often hear that societal pressures to be thin cause many young women and men to develop an eating disorder. Many individuals in our culture, for a number of reasons, are concerned with their weight and diet.

Yet less than half of 1 percent of all women develop anorexia nervosa, which indicates to us that societal pressure alone isn’t enough to cause someone to develop this disease,” said Walter H. Kaye, M.D., professor of psychiatry, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine.

“Our research has found that genes seem to play a substantial role in determining who is vulnerable to developing an eating disorder.

However, the societal pressure isn’t irrelevant; it may be the environmental trigger that releases a person’s genetic risk.”

Families should not be blamed for causing anorexia. In fact, they are often devastated and suffer from the consequences of this illness.” [sources: Yahoo and Physorg]