Each year since 1985 the Center for Disease Control and Prevention has tracked obesity on a state by state basis to determine the ever-expanding rate of obesity in America. One way to define obesity is through the Body Mass Index (BMI). A BMI greater than 30 would be considered obese. Most adults have had their BMI measured for insurance reasons or general health assessments. It is based on the person’s height and weight and measured against a large statistical pool of data. For a 5’4” person to be considered obese they would have to weigh approximately 30 pounds over the norm.
As a country we like to get everything first and fast, and it would appear that we are on track to beating the rest of the world by getting larger at a very high rate. In 1986, there were only a handful of states in which 14% or less of the population was considered obese. Several other states at that time had less than 10% of their population falling into that category. As of 2006, three states including Alabama, Mississippi and West Virginia have populations that had an obesity rate of 1 in 3 people or just over 30% of the population. In the remaining states, the obesity rate was 1 in 4. A few exceptions included Colorado, Hawaii and Rhode Island which were 1 in 5, or 20% obese. Way to go you three! However, let’s not forget this is simply a measure of obese individuals and not those considered overweight.
When individuals that were considered overweight but not quite obese were added to the obese, the numbers jumped much higher to approximately 6 in 10 individuals. A trip to any food court should alert one to the current problem. To be considered overweight a person would have to fall into the category of 25-29.9 on the BMI scale.
What is it that drives this unhealthy trend? Most experts would suggest diet and physical activity or lack there of. Eating healthy isn’t always cheap, and it costs little to load up on a buffet full of “energy-dense foods.” Those are foods high in calories but not necessarily high in nutrients. These diets are full of inexpensive ingredients such as fats, sugars and heavily processed or refined grains.
The economics of food is certainly a driving force as well. Consider this, if one were to overlay a map of the states demonstrating obese areas of our country with another map that illustrated levels of poverty there would be a high correlation. In fact, the CDC did just that and found this correlation. The correlation was quite high in particular with southern states. They then were able to look at the same thing by zip codes within the states and found similar results. Hence, increased poverty levels go hand in hand with increased waistlines.
In 2003, RTI International, a non-profit think tank, and the CDC estimated that $75 billion in health care costs were attributable to obesity. Taxpayers had to pick up nearly one half of that cost through programs such as Medicare and Medicaid.
Individual responsibility certainly is at the core of diet modification and exercise, yet there may be other means to slow this rising health crisis? Recent trends in legislation may increase taxes on junk foods as was done with cigarettes. School boards across the country have been limiting choices in school lunches for contents such as junk foods and soft drinks while further educating students on nutrition. This is a good start as children are the fastest growing element in the obesity trend.
America appears to be awakening to this enormous problem. Even television is scoring ratings for several weight loss programs including one for children, another for celebrities and a third for the general obese adults. These shows share some good advice on exercise and diet modification.
Shrinking America’s waistline will take some time, but improving the quality of one’s life is well worth that effort. Of note, a problem with Body Mass Index is that it doesn’t take into account individuals with higher than average muscle mass. Therefore, a body builder or athlete could by all measures appear to be obese based on this type of scale. For more on BMI and how to calculate it go to www.nhlbisupport.com/bmi.
