Over 73% of U.S. Adults Overweight or Obese
medpagetoday.com
medpagetoday.com
Edit: the change in population argument makes sense. I’ve always thought it was flawed as a good friend of mine is short, very stocky, and fit - but is technically “obese”.
Edit 2: I was curious how this trend looks going back further than the 80’s. “The evolution of BMI values of US adults: 1882-1986” https://voxeu.org/article/100-years-us-obesity
More, for many individuals, it is more accurate than folks give credit.
https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/images/databriefs/351-400/db360-fig...
It's not like there is some underlying ground truth on what 'overweight' is, is there?
I'd love it if there was technology at some point accessible to everyone that would allow for more informative measurements (w/ privacy considerations).
What is 'accurate' in this context? Accurate against what? What are you comparing it against to get a measure of accuracy?
It indicates against 'normal weight' - but if the population's weight changes then the 'normal weight' changes with it doesn't it?
The normal weight may change, but the ideal healthy weight doesn't. The idea of a healthy weight is misleading, as there is more of a healthy body fat percentage. Even that's is an oversimplification, as visceral fat has far more health implications that subcutaneous fat.
That isn't very much, really. Some people are far from the norm, but generally the broad-shouldered people aren't the short ones.
Is your friend built like a running back?
https://www.gssiweb.org/sports-science-exchange/article/sse-...
We have more sedentary work, so that's a factor.
I also wonder a lot about other things that have changed and how that impacts our bodies, including weight. There are a lot of things that have changed which don't get questioned in terms of "How does that impact health?" and which I hesitate to specify because I'm pretty sure it will get dismissed as crazy talk to wonder about the connection between such things.
What? Is there a typo here? 30 years ago was 1991. Are you saying that most Americans were living in agrarian settings in 1991?
The UN estimates 2007 was the year when, for the first time, more people in the world lived in urban than in rural areas.
https://ourworldindata.org/urbanization#number-of-people-liv...
Here is some data on the US:
http://www.theusaonline.com/people/urbanization.htm
Sorry for the sloppiness. I think the thrust of my point is accurate: We used to have more physical jobs and the world on the whole became citified relatively recently. But I'm probably running a fever and mashed a few things together in my brain inaccurately.
The change was really rooted in the fact that younger people coming in were less fit. Young people used to take summer construction jobs and from what I gather that no longer happens anywhere near as much as it used to, which leaves the construction industry struggling to fill those jobs.
Kids used to run and play outside and now they play video games at the TV or the computer and hardly leave the house compared to when I was growing up. And there are just a whole lot of factors there.
My father grew up on a farm, though my father was born in the 1920s. I grew up with a garden out back and we used to go on public lands and pick blue berries in summer and part of the meat on our table was squirrel and deer meat that my father hunted (or, one year, a friend of his gifted us half a buck to fill our freezer).
I grew up in the 'burbs. I am sure there are still people who hunt and gather as part of their way of life, but I mostly hear this about Native Americans, especially in Alaska which is relatively undeveloped. There seems to be a lot less of that sort of thing for people in cities or suburbs, but I have no actual data on that. That's just an impression and I don't know how much that impression is skewed by personal experience, which doesn't always align with aggregate statistics.
But I'm quite clear we generally have less physical jobs/lives overall and more citified lives overall than when I was growing up.
I'm sure that's a big factor, but I also think there are myriad other factors that get short shrift and we mostly don't bother to discuss them. As just one example: Urban planners used to take fitness into consideration when planning cities and my understanding is this is mostly a thing of the past.
I'm just talking. There's a global pandemic and like most of the world right now, I don't get out much.
I'm trying to do other things and leave this conversation. I don't think I really have more to add. I'm not upset with you and I'm not feeling defensive. I'm just rambling.
Have a great day.
Haha, I hear you there. Have a good one.
- Plastics in EVERYTHING throw off hormone balances, including both metabolisms and... other things hormones affect. It's not just BPA.
- Dramatically different ages and rates of childbearing. Both lifestyle and hormones again.
- Pornography has completely changed how many men (and some women) interact with society. Lifestyle and... hormones.
- What percent of Americans are on some form of chemical antidepressant? A lot.
I'm sure there are dozens of other plausible drivers, and the answer isn't any single one.
But when you completely upend society in a generation, changing a thousand variables at once, I do not personally feel comfortable saying "far more likely" about any particular cause for any particular societal outcome.
-The Farm Bill and USA Sugar Program, which is a bipartisan issue but which shouldn't exist in the first place https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._Sugar_Program
-Increasing use of social media and sedentary lifestyles. When you are just inside on your phone all the time this is NOT healthy.
-This obesity problem is probably going to kill more people than COVID and the opioid epidemic, but noone wants to talk about it as it directly threatens various established interests.
This is already the case. More people are killed by their unhealthy lifestyles than by anything else.
There are many people talking about it. Adhering to healthy life style is difficult for many people. Most obese know perfectly well why they are obese an what it takes to be healthy.
I never would have thought I'd be able to keep up with it (love sugar too much) but actually it's been not so hard once I set my mind to it. I gave up alcohol a few years ago and this has been easier than that.
We'll see how long it lasts. It seems weird to think about doing it forever, but who knows. For now I see no reason to stop, and lots of reasons to keep going.
but yes if school lunches had a meal shake option many kids would prefer its flavor over the existing options. and its miles healthier.
However, since that's only federally, it's less attractive. States would probably prefer a tax on a per-state basis, since it would be a source of revenue for them, unlike the savings from federal subsidy cuts.
I'd prefer unlabelled products and no advertising etc to a tax. I dunno. It seems healthy living and the current food industry are perhaps fundamentally incompatible. I would support some form of regulation aimed at improving public health outcomes, but struggle to see a tax as the answer for me personally, though it may work for some.
Chocolate and confectionery (added sugar above 0,5 g pr. 100 g.), 3,76 USD per kilogram
Chocolate and confectionery (added sukker maximum 0,5 g pr. 100 g.), 3,32 USD per kilogram
...etc.
When I read that I could not help but make a connection with the diet/way of life of many middle aged Americans...
I won't get a heart attack from your second hand obesity. There are a lot of other unsafe behaviors that have more severe negative externalities than obesity.
Also what about all the other people who are "clogging the health care system"? Does the drinker with liver problems? What about the cyclist who needs to have surgery to repair a compound fracture they got in an accident? How about the surfer who has skin cancer from being in the sun too much? What about all the old people in the health care system? Do you deserve medical attention over them?
If the problem is not having capacity for medical system, let's build more capacity not stigmatize the people who need medical care.
It's incredible when you put it that way. Stated another way, at least in some parts of the world, our quality of life has gotten so high that we can now afford to lower it on purpose.
We have so many resources that for the first time in human history, this is actually a viable option for people. It's wild to think about. I wish you could travel back in time and explain this to someone a century ago, their brains could short circuit.
Obesity is a symptom.
My understanding is that Whole Foods is a premium supermarket, so perhaps some people feel he is being a bit out of touch with a large portion of the population. A bit like the famous "let them eat cake" suggestion...
Where do we stop then? Depression can often be avoided or cured by changing to a more healthy lifestyle. Should those with depression and a not-so-healthy lifestyle also be stigmatized and have no health insurance?
And no one should be denied health insurance for any reason, obviously. (Unless you're proposing abolishing private health insurance completely, in which case yes please.)
More Americans are dependent on processed food than ever. Except that processed food has declined in quality and nutritional value over the past few decades, primarily to keep costs under control. There are confounding factors but this is a key driver.
As the world’s reserve currency, the USD does not experience inflation in the same manner as most other countries. Rather than food prices skyrocketing, quality and optionally portions are reduced to compensate for declining purchasing power.
I ask sincerely - but in transparency it does come from a sense that its not as much to do w/ cost as it seems to be from my perspective.
> People could eat relatively healthy if they wanted to, but they don't. [emphasis added]
It's not an issue of want. I've lived in a near food desert. I was in a relatively well-off part of a very poor part of town (many people lived without cars, high unemployment, etc.). The local grocer had god awful meat and produce (produce would spoil in 1-2 days of purchase, meat wasn't much better). To get good food I'd drive sometimes 10+ miles away and get, for the same list price, much better quality meat and vegetables. I wasn't breaking the bank, but I had access to a vehicle and the time to take to go make the purchase (the local grocer was only good, for me, for staples like dried beans, rice, and flour). The others living nearby without a car, or without the time/money to dedicate to that extra trip for groceries had to subsist on what was available locally, which meant often some very poor quality foods (with regard to health outcomes at least).
Otherwise, I agree that good food is not expensive. I saved money and got healthier by spending less on food (chicken breast and ground beef at $2-3/pound, catch on sale days and freeze; rice and beans cost maybe $10/month as a single adult; a few key vegetables and fruits cost $5-10/week).
But an equally valid observation is that the lack of grocery stores and the presence of fast food and gas stations/corner stores produce an apparent preference without indicating a real preference.
Do people in food deserts prefer Slim Jims from the corner store and Big Macs or does it seem that way because of a lack of choice?
Markets aren't perfect, contrary to popular belief on HN and other discussion boards. And even if something eventually shows up, it's not going to show up overnight. It still takes capital to pull off, which the locals almost universally lacked (racism is a hell of a thing in the US South) and outsiders have to decide it's worth the gamble for very little gain. How many people want to open a grocery store where 90% of your customers are on food stamps, and if they open it how well stocked will it be? (Based on the one grocery store we had, very poorly.)
And by the way, you have food deserts in europe (Alps, Balkans). I've never been to Estern Europe but a friend of mine is selling mercs (security detail to be exact) there and i souldn't be surprise if some food desert existed between Crimea and Oural from what i'm told.
Small productor market and product are politically tainted too, so a small percentage of the population won't ever come in. And health shouldn't be about politics.
https://www.investopedia.com/articles/07/consumerpriceindex....