What do you think of the obesity epidemic in the U.S.?

NewLIFEstyle4ME

Today, while I was out and about shopping...I saw something that broke my heart and then scared me. Almost everyone I saw, men, women, little boys and girls, teens and even babies...so many people, I'd say 10 to 1 people were/are obese, morbidly obese and overweight and while it sadden me greatly...it SCARED me too. Everywhere I looked people are totally obese and morbidly obese and overweight EVERYWHERE! Of course, I'm one of them, which is why I'm here, but still--it was like something from the movie Wall-E or the Twilight Zone or something:brokenheart: :embarassed: :ohwell:

I literally started counting how many slim/trim people I saw, because they were so few and far in between--I could literally count them. I saw many overweight people (especially young people) as well, I mean A LOT, everywhere.

What do you think of the obesity epidemic in the U.S. ?

What do you think when you see soooooo many obese, morbidly obese and overweight people(men, women, children, teens and even babies) far out numbering the so-called normal weight (I like to call slim and trim---NOT skinny...I did see a couple/few skinny people (mostly girls) but hardly any skinny/underweight people at ALL). What do you think of this--or do you think about it at all?

What do you think will happen to us as a society--because this isn't news, but obesity seems to be spreading outta control--it looked terrible and sad and scary and I'm super concerned--are you?

rfuchs

I feel sad for the children. The decisions are being made for them, they have no control over their food, and are creating horrible habits for adulthood.

rosebarnalice

My home state of Kentucky is one of the "ground zero" states for the obesity epidemic.

Lots of fried foods, a distaste for vegetables that aren't fried or loaded with salt, and gallons of soda and sweet tea help us tip the scale among the heaviest states in the union.

We're also kings in cancer, diabetes, and heart disease.

If I were 30 years younger I'd be scared sh*tless that an increasing chunk of my paycheck would be paying for my-- and everyone else's -- health care.

charovnitza

I'm reading a book called Fat Chance, by Robert Lustig, which speaks about your topic. Unfortunately, you're right.

I'm going to quote him here: " in 2001 6 million children in America were seriously overweight. That number has tripled in a decade, the numbers are now surpassing 20 million"

"Numerous diseases connected to obesity have become more prevalent over the past 30 years. What's more, all of them are now found in children as young as 5 years old. We even have an epidemic of obese 6 month olds!"

And "The World Health Organization (WHO) has shown that the percentage of obese humans globally has doubled in the last 28 years...Even people in developing countrieds are obese."

My words now, it's not just the US, it's everywhere.

The author has been a doctor and medical researcher specializing in obesity for 16 years. I haven't finished the book, but it's made a real impression on me.

mountaingirl2207

I moved to Florida from Colorado last fall. When we first got here, we stayed with my in laws while we looked for a house. The school that my daughter went to for the first month was in the free breakfast/lunch program, and like 75% of the kids at the school were on the plan. The options they had were HORRIBLE. Pop tarts, sugary cereals, bagels loaded with flavored cream cheese.... and it wasn't one thing they could pick, but 3!!! The kids would line up every morning and get all this food and nobody would be there to tell them that it was enough. Sadly, I think I is way cheaper to eat horribly than to eat well, so I think the obesity epidemic goes hand in hand with our economic problems. The drive through line at mcds wraps around the block on Tuesdays and Thursdays when happy meals are cheaper. If we want to change things, we need to make healthy food more readily available and educate people about what they are eating/ feeding their children!

lilbearzmom

I didn't give it much thought until I started my ICU clinical rounds for my RT degree. Literally, 3/4 of the people in the ICU are morbidly obese- like every room you looked into. It really hit home for me when I started to notice the hospital populations.

Thepinkdaisy

I notice this stuff too all the time. I play a game as I am driving and count how many overweight ppl I see vs how many healthy people. Nearly everyone you see is overweight.

However, when you go to places like San Diego CA it is the opposite. Nearly everyone IS in shape. My bf and I played a game to see if we could find an overweight person. It took us about an hour and we only saw ONE. Everyone was walking, biking, skateboarding. I guess where it is warmer, there is more of an opportunity to "get out and move". In colder states we would freeze many days in the winters if we tried to walk. The ice, snow and freezing rain are also a factor. Lack of sun is yet another factor as the sun (vit D) can speed metabolism.

When I visit my home state of Nebraska I notice that there are more heavy people there (by an alarming rate) than there is in my current state in the south.

The children are what scare me the most. For the first time in the history of the world, our children's life expectancy as adults is less than ours. It has always been that each generation was expected to live to an older age than their parents due to modern medicine, etc. Now that has changed, it's due to lifestyle and the poisons in foods (video games, Internet, texting, McDonald's on every corner).

As a school teacher, I remember looking at the children lined up to go out for recess and nearly every one of them had an electronic game in their hand. They were wanting to go out and sit under a tree and play their games. I made each one of them put them up. They asked, "what are we going to do?". . .I said "grab a ball", you'll figure it out. They were 'BORED!'

In the cafeteria at school, the children in some schools don't have to eat their lunch, before allowed to purchase countless cookies. Yet in a different state where I taught, sweets are not allowed in schools, even if it is a birthday or Halloween, etc. Everyone must bring a healthy snack. We can't take recess away for punishment according to our new laws, so instead we made them walk outside as punishment.

ParisKennedy

I notice this stuff too all the time. I play a game as I am driving and count how many overweight ppl I see vs how many healthy people. Nearly everyone you see is overweight.

However, when you go to places like San Diego CA it is the opposite. Nearly everyone IS in shape. My bf and I played a game to see if we could find an overweight person. It took us about an hour and we only saw ONE. Everyone was walking, biking, skateboarding. I guess where it is warmer, there is more of an opportunity to "get out and move". In colder states we would freeze many days in the winters if we tried to walk. The ice, snow and freezing rain are also a factor. Lack of sun is yet another factor as the sun (vit D) can speed metabolism.

When I visit my home state of Nebraska I notice that there are more heavy people there (by an alarming rate) than there is in my current state in the south.

The children are what scare me the most. For the first time in the history of the world, our children's life expectancy as adults is less than ours. It has always been that each generation was expected to live to an older age than their parents due to modern medicine, etc. Now that has changed, it's due to lifestyle and the poisons in foods (video games, Internet, texting, McDonald's on every corner).

As a school teacher, I remember looking at the children lined up to go out for recess and nearly every one of them had an electronic game in their hand. They were wanting to go out and sit under a tree and play their games. I made each one of them put them up. They asked, "what are we going to do?". . .I said "grab a ball", you'll figure it out. They were 'BORED!'

In the cafeteria at school, the children in some schools don't have to eat their lunch, before allowed to purchase countless cookies. Yet in a different state where I taught, sweets are not allowed in schools, even if it is a birthday or Halloween, etc. Everyone must bring a healthy snack. We can't take recess away for punishment according to our new laws, so instead we made them walk outside as punishment.

RogueNanna

My feelings about obesity are that it is a sad phenomenon. My thinking about it is that there are many factors involved. One of the foremost is STRESS. Not just the hormonal consequences of it (which are profoundly disturbing), but the behavioral as well.

The frantic pace at which we live is not conducive to really relaxing and enjoying food, and so many of us just "shovel" it in as we run. We also have an abundance of mass produced, highly processed, genetically altered, readily available foods which we do not have to physically labor over to bring to table.

NewLIFEstyle4ME

I feel sad for the children. The decisions are being made for them, they have no control over their food, and are creating horrible habits for adulthood.

Wow...I saw so many children today, little kids who were absolutely obese... It's shocking!

Emtabo01

I do what I can do instill healthy eating and exercise values and habits to my kids so they don't become on of the stats too. I can't control what anyone else does, other than try to set a good example.

Graelwyn75

It is not nearly as bad here in the Uk but we are catching up with a lot of USA style eating places cropping up over here. Even decades ago when I went to the USA quite a few times on vacation, I was stunned by how overweight people were. My father, who was about 70Ibs overweight, looked positively slender. There were people in wheelchairs being pushed around Disney world, because they were so fat.

I blame our high speed, high tech society and greed. Greed of those marketing all the crap food on the shelves, and greed of those consuming it. Granted. stress does not help, but we seem to live in a time when everyone wants everything now, and wants all of it. Everything is so easily available, time seems shorter than ever, and many of us spend far too much time glued to computer screens and television screens rather than being outdoors and active. It all adds up. It has been made very difficult to eat a natural diet because so much is processed in some manner now, or been messed about with.

It looks to be the case that at the rate things are going, 3/4 of the USA population will be overweight or obese because children tend to follow the example of the parent and their diet is often controlled by the parent. I noticed on Biggest Loser, one couple taking their already overweight 6 year old for doughnuts. 'Nuff said.

neanderthin

The USA is ranked #1 and eating itself into economic abyss.
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/hea_obe-health-obesity

lithezebra

I think that the modern American lifestyle is at odds with human physiology. However, I don't take the obesity epidemic personally, nor am I unduly shocked by other people's weight.

raeleek

I do think it's sad but I don't think that it's just something that hit us out of nowhere and it's not something that is just hitting the United States. The whole world is going through the same thing on some level.

If you think back to how much food has changed and the way we deal with it on a daily basis. Food is all over the place all the time. There is no place where there isn't food or we don't eat.

Also you have to take into consideration how much LESS physical activity we do that 50/100 years ago. Technology does everything for us now. There are machines that fix machines.

There is also a lack of nutritional information out there. Admittedly I have fallen for a lot of the fad diets over time but look at our own food pyramid. How many times has that changed since it came out? There is a lot of old information that people hold onto as the written word and in the next ten years imagine what they'll come out with.

I realize that there are a lot of programs in place to try to help people but it's going to take a long time to fix this. It's easy to not care about your health and it takes planning and dedication to eat well and exercise. It takes will power and an inner strength on the days where you just don't want to and most people like the path of least resistance. I know, I was one of them!

emtjmac

I think it's... bad?

Polymorphist

I'm actually shocked to be put in the obese category recently. I'm one of those people who never had a weight problem - I ran nearly every day and was at least somewhat conscious about what I ate. I wasn't OCD about it nor did I weight my food, but I definitely made sure to get at least half my body weight in grams of protein everyday. I was fine until I stopped most activity in 2008. I went from about 170 lbs up over 200lbs. I was shocked when health professionals weighed me at work one day.

My problem seemed to be that I was socializing more and that meant beers and fried appetizers like boneless wings. We also might do a thick pizza one night a week. I basically stopped watching what I was doing and wasn't exercising. I think that other people have the same problem - too many choices out there and it takes time to either prepare food, plan the day's meals or research what they are shoveling into their bodies. There also seems to be a "i'll fix it later" attitude, I know I certainly was guilty of that. What kills me now is that the work and effort required to lose the fat and get out of the obese range is much harder than just making some basic daily choices and 30 minutes of exercise/day. I know people who've never actually been inside a gym before and they are pushing middle age.

KenosFeoh

It's not so bad here in the Pacific NW. Most of the people I see in public places look height/weight proportionate, pretty much. Those I identify as obese are in the minority. I definitely see them, but not as many as people I'd consider normal. Some of them are probably overweight, statistically speaking.

AllTehBeers

You know, it's sad that so many people don't enjoy an active lifestyle anymore.

That said, i'd feel so ****ing fat knowing that people are looking at me and "counting" me as some kind of lined up cow.

Seeing me for a few seconds in a mall, you'd not know that I've worked hard and busted my *kitten* to lose 65 pounds. Maybe half of them just started eating right in the Jan. 1st crowd.

stines72

i hurt for them, i want them to be healthy.

TooLeftFeet

This is actually one of the reasons I make sure my kids see me work out. So they know it's healthy. And normal. I grew up with fried food, soda, and koolaid, and thanks to metabolism, I did NOT have a weight problem. I should have....I ate crap, hardly any veggies, no water. I do have junk in my house, and we all enjoy it in moderation. But that is also balanced with lots of healthy stuff throughout the day. We really have to set the foundation and the groundwork for these kids.

stackhsc

similar experiences. Sitting outside the dollar store one day last year and i estimated around 70-80 percent overweigh and over half of that would have been bmi classed at or near enough at obese.
I have started to notice that in grocery stores i tend to see a smaller percentage of overweight folks in the produce and "heatlhy" areas and more overweight in the frozen foods and snack isles...... while this makes sense on the face of it i also have started to wonder how much of it is about choices and how much is about the cost of food. Prepared foods and snacks tend to be cheap or on sale while produce and healthy foods tend not to be so much. I know since we have started eating healthier our bill has gone up a fair bit and im sure many cant afford it. I also suspect its the vicious cycle thing too of you get use to what you eat.

AllTehBeers

I've noticed that it's definitely related to family income. I drive around a lot for my job and I go to the high-end and low-end areas. In the more affluent areas, obese people are not the norm. I got stuck a school crosswalk the other day in a better neighborhood and had about 150 kids pass in front of my car, and I didn't see a single fat one. But if I'm in an area with cheaper housing, more than half would be chubby or bigger. It's cultural as much as anything. I have a theory that kids tend to be about the same size as their mom, and financially successful men don't generally marry obese women.

I wasn't fat as a kid. It wasn't until I made my own money that I got fat.

I have no comment on income related to obesity, I'm just stating my OWN circumstance.

carryingon

I feel sad for the children. The decisions are being made for them, they have no control over their food, and are creating horrible habits for adulthood.

This. My pediatrician expressed her concern to me. I was worried because a couple of my children are small and have stayed on the 25% curve since they were born (which she said is good because they are staying on the same curve). She told me that it was actually a nice change because the majority of children she sees are over.

Iceman420

What do you think of the obesity epidemic in the U.S. ?

I think it's hard to NOT be obese in this country. There is so much fast food, junk food, soda, etc. None of it is healthy but we buy it because it's cheap and it tastes good. Especially when money is tight, like it is now. I'm as guilty of this as anyone.

The food industry makes tons of money off our hunger, and the medical industry makes tons of money when we get sick. It's a win-win situation for them. So they keep shoving this cheap crap down our throats, knowing we will buy it. Until something major changes in this country, the obesity epidemic will continue.

zephtalah

I guess I don't like the term epidemic. In my mind, an epidemic is a communicable disease. I don't believe being overweigh is communicable nor do I believe it is a disease. (That is not to say there are not real diseases that cause weight gain.) It is sad to see overweight children. The adults I don't feel sad for because they chose that. As far as the economic/weight association I see often, I understand that it is more expensive to buy organic produce, but healthy foods (carrots, dried beans, apples, leaf lettuce not bagged,etc.) are cheaper than fast food. It takes more time, but that is a choice people have to make. Parents need to step up and decide what their children will or will not eat and not cave in when junior throws a fit. People need to step up and decide what they will eat and not cave in when they "don't feel like it." You have control over you. I have control over me. This isn't a country problem. This is a personal accountability and character problem. I am sure this sounds horribly caustic and mean, and I don't intend it as such. However, I think if each person takes personal responsibility instead of listing all the reasons it is difficult then we will see a change.

neanderthin

I'm reading a book called Fat Chance, by Robert Lustig, which speaks about your topic. Unfortunately, you're right.

I'm going to quote him here: " in 2001 6 million children in America were seriously overweight. That number has tripled in a decade, the numbers are now surpassing 20 million"

"Numerous diseases connected to obesity have become more prevalent over the past 30 years. What's more, all of them are now found in children as young as 5 years old. We even have an epidemic of obese 6 month olds!"

And "The World Health Organization (WHO) has shown that the percentage of obese humans globally has doubled in the last 28 years...Even people in developing countrieds are obese."

My words now, it's not just the US, it's everywhere.

The author has been a doctor and medical researcher specializing in obesity for 16 years. I haven't finished the book, but it's made a real impression on me.

With all due respect, he has a bad reputation.

He may have screwed up in presenting some facts badly, but he's no dummy and not everything he has to say should be discounted until it's read and scrutinized.

TorontoFoodist

I was born in the 1960's and it was right around that time that agricultural policies in the US and Canada were changed to one of over-production. Junk-food essentially didn't exist before then, even things like McDonalds and Burger King were few and far between when I was a small kid, but by the late-70s and early-80s it had all started to change.

Phillip-Morris the company charged with addicting people to cigarettes moved all it's money into General Mills, Nabisco, Kraft, and other corporate foods. They became almost overnight the biggest producers of junk food in the world. And they put the 'pedal to the metal' radically changing how food is marketed and sold. They developed strategies based on salt, sugar and fat to get people into 'hyper-eating'.

http://www.democracynow.org/embed/story/2013/3/1/salt_sugar_fat_ny_times_reporter

In January I was in Varadero, Cuba for a week relaxing on the beach. It was great but it was also a real eye-opener. The Cuban life expectancy is now greater than in the US, and it was really scary walking down the street in Varadero... there was no advertising.. no junk food.. no Burger King or McDonalds.. no Coca-cola... and everyone and I mean EVERYONE who was Cuban was in shape and athletic! They don't have junk food or video games, they play sports and read, they're all In Shape, it's like going back to the US and Canada in the 1950s or something. The only morbidly fat people were from Canada and Europe, the Cubans all looked like they could run a marathon, it was crazy.

Now in Canada soft drinks are in the top 3 foods purchased at supermarkets. Since when was Coca-cola a 'food staple' of people's diets?

In the mid-70s a big NFL lineman was about 6'1" tall and roughly 205 lbs. By the mid-80s you had the (approppirately named) Walter "The Refridgerator" Perry, who was somehting like 340+ lbs. People just got huge in about a decade or so period. One study I saw says we waste about 40% of all the food we buy in north america now. I could go on but it's too depressing.

squirrelythegreat

I look at my before and after picture, and I think to myself "self, what epidemic are people talking about. Clearly this country is just 90 days from being in great shape, they are just too lazy to put down their cable and workout"

Its self inflicted, like calling suicide murder. Parents are bad for raising their kids with technology. And the upcoming generation will need to fix itself all on its own since nobody is going to do it for them.

AllTehBeers

I was born in the 1960's and it was right around that time that agricultural policies in the US and Canada were changed to one of over-production. Junk-food essentially didn't exist before then, even things like McDonalds and Burger King were few and far between when I was a small kid, but by the late-70s and early-80s it had all started to change.

Phillip-Morris the company charged with addicting people to cigarettes moved all it's money into General Mills, Nabisco, Kraft, and other corporate foods. They became almost overnight the biggest producers of junk food in the world. And they put the 'pedal to the metal' radically changing how food is marketed and sold. They developed strategies based on salt, sugar and fat to get people into 'hyper-eating'.

<iframe width="400" height="225" src="http://www.democracynow.org/embed/story/2013/3/1/salt_sugar_fat_ny_times_reporter&quot; frameborder="0"></iframe>

In January I was in Varadero, Cuba for a week relaxing on the beach. It was great but it was also a real eye-opener. The Cuban life expectancy is now greater than in the US, and it was really scary walking down the street in Varadero... there was no advertising.. no junk food.. no Burger King or McDonalds.. no Coca-cola... and everyone and I mean EVERYONE who was Cuban was in shape and athletic! They don't have junk food or video games, they play sports and read, they're all In Shape, it's like going back to the US and Canada in the 1950s or something. The only morbidly fat people were from Canada and Europe, the Cubans all looked like they could run a marathon, it was crazy.

Now in Canada soft drinks are in the top 3 foods purchased at supermarkets. Since when was Coca-cola a 'food staple' of people's diets?

In the mid-70s a big NFL lineman was about 6'1" tall and roughly 205 lbs. By the mid-80s you had the (approppirately named) Walter "The Refridgerator" Perry, who was somehting like 340+ lbs. People just got huge in about a decade or so period. One study I saw says we waste about 40% of all the food we buy in north america now. I could go on but it's too depressing.

We're kids of the "if it feels good, do it" generation. I'm not surprised our feel good spilled over into food.

MaraDiaz

I can tell you with fair accuracy what demographic a given television program is aiming for based on the commercials. See ads for luxury vehicles and travel? You're watching a program geared toward the upper middle class and above. See commercials for pizza, chips, and candy-bars? You're watching programming geared toward blue collar worker and below.

It's not that the more affluent are more virtuous and informed eaters, it's simply that they have more money to entertain and enjoy themselves in ways that don't involve stimulating brain chemicals with cheap foods.

There are other reasons, too, of course, including availability and access to information plus the time and energy to properly absorb and put into practice healthy eating and exercise, but most of it I think boils down to food as a form of entertainment and comfort for those of us who can afford little else. For similar reasons alcohol, drug, and cigarette smoking are also higher among the poor.