Just a few years ago, we had 9 states with “high obesity rates,” which means at least 30% of adults in that state are obese. Now we have a full 12 states with obesity rates that are 30% or more, and there’s no indication of things getting better anytime soon.
Worse Than We Thought?
What’s worse is that, according to a few studies, weight gain may actually be worse than we think it is.
Americans apparently don’t report as much of a weight gain as they actually experience, partly because they’re in denial about the effects of their diet and partly because they don’t use the scale as often as they should.
The CDC conducted a study of over 380,000 participants from 2008 to 2009 that tracked lifestyle indicators. Many people reported their weight from a year ago as being higher than it actually was, meaning the participants thought they’d lost weight. Most people had actually weighed much less a year ago, though, and on average everyone was still gaining weight and getting unhealthier.
A Nation In Denial
These statistics point out a scary fact about our nation’s health prognosis. Not only are we becoming more obese as a nation, but we think we’re becoming healthier. We’re not even in tune with the reality of our situation.
Helping Our Youth
One fact about weight loss is certain: if you start out with bad habits, it’s tremendously more difficult to change them. Unfortunately, we’re training our youth to become overweight adults for the rest of their lives. And many of them are already overweight themselves.
We must emphatically state that this does not have to be the case, and that we must make changes to our current situation. It’s well known that what we feed our children in schools really does affect their health for the better, and if we can harness this fact, we have true power to change these kid’s lives.
Parenting must also change, but since we nobody can do a parent’s job for them, we can at
least provide a good influence in schools. It’s true, after all, that school children can make decisions for themselves when given the right information and the right options to choose from.
Jamie Oliver has done inspiring work in Huntington, VA to change this problem. If we can listen to people like Jamie, we can begin to improve the future of our entire nation.
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