Thursday, January 14, 2010

Obese Nation

Almost as if to underscore the point I made in my earlier post today, I came on this: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100113/ap_on_he_me/us_med_obesity_plateau;_ylt=AjGEch9ebtuxnwEDouiQG7_VJRIF;_ylu=X3oDMTJuczV1Z3ZhBGFzc2V0A2FwLzIwMTAwMTEzL3VzX21lZF9vYmVzaXR5X3BsYXRlYXUEY3BvcwMyBHBvcwM1BHNlYwN5bl90b3Bfc3RvcnkEc2xrA2RhdGF1c29iZXNpdA----

America has extremely high levels of obesity. According to US government data more than two-thirds of US adults are overweight and more than one-third of children are. Thirty-four percent of US adults are officially obese and 17% of children are.

The good news is that while we're fat, we're not getting fatter. Obesity rates have actually held steady for the last five years.

The other good news as reported is that people are getting serious about the root causes of weight problems in this country--bad food and lack of exercise. Even the White House is getting in on the act with Michelle Obama promising to make child-hood obesity prevention a focus (I'm hoping this means we'll be hearing less about which designer's dress she wore last).

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