Top 13 Nations in % of Pop. Most Overweight ....

[DAOTEC]

09-25-10 11:19 AM | "soaring obesity rates make the US the fattest country in the OECD." More alarmingly, the problem of obesity in the U.S. is not limited to adults:

1) Mexico - 69.5 %

2) USA - 68 %

3) New Zealand - 62.6 %

4) Australia - 61.4 %

5) U.K. - 61.4 %

6) Ireland - 61 %

7) Iceland - 60.2 %

8) Canada - 60 %

9) Chile - 59.7 %

10) Greece - 58.9 %

11) Slovenia - 55.1 %

12) Luxembourg - 54.8 %

13) Spain - 54.8 %

Source Read Report: [http://huffingtonpost.com/2010/09/25/worlds-highest-obesity-ra]

Report by Nation: [http://www.oecd.org/document]


What do You think ?

 

[The Hitch]

What is mexico doing there

 

[ruamruam]

What is mexico doing there

They are cooking a greater proportion of their food in oil. Cook in oil you get fat.

 

[Hairy Wheels]

They are cooking a greater proportion of their food in oil. Cook in oil you get fat.

You are partially right. Oil is a problem, though I eat olive oil with almost everything and I'm not fat (do fat people post here?). Type of oil is an issue I suppose, and how you use it.

Big problem is corn and refined sugars. The standard of living in Mexico is edging a little higher...that means more garbage food. You don't get to start eating the good stuff until you're middle class. By then you're already fat.

Corn based sweetener is awful for you, you're better off going with the sugar (not that it's great). In the US, Canada and probably Mexico, you can find it in almost everything...particularly breads and cereals. Add to that the suburban lifestyle we tend to live and there you have it. I always like to go to cities where walking is a bigger part of life...lots of thin people (faves are New York, Vancouver and Amsterdam...).

 

[fatandfast]

I hope the USA is number 1 in something..if we work hard we can pull ahead of Mexico

 

[usedtobefast]

mexico is there because they are eating american style food. as in fast food and
junk food type snacks.

 

[stefank]

How come England (UK) is ahead of Australia on the graph, but behind it on the table?

Which is believable?

 

[Fourier]

What is mexico doing there

Look at what Krebs regularly posts on the Cuisine Corner thread. If I lived in a country with food like that I'd be morbidly obese

 

[RoadieBeast]

I would think NZ is only coming 3rd because of all the Pacific Islanders, nearly 100% of Fijians etc living in NZ are overweight, and totally killing our public health care.

 

[kiwirider]

I would think NZ is only coming 3rd because of all the Pacific Islanders, nearly 100% of Fijians etc living in NZ are overweight, and totally killing our public health care.

No. According to my boss' wife (who is an epidemiologist) the problem is widespread across the country, irrespective of race. While some races are more genetically predisposed to being overweight, the principal problem in NZ is lifestyle (which includes diet).

The ranking makes sense, as the country kids itself about being "sporty", but we have one of the highest car ownership rates in the world and average annual usage that is higher than a lot of larger countries (which, by definition, indicates high frequency of use since we can't do 2000km road trips and the like). Also, do some food label reading and see how much added sugar there is in our food - even when you wouldn't think it's necessary (eg., chilli beans). Add to that the average Kiwi's meat consumption (and the way that most Kiwi's eat it), and it's starting to make sense ...

I was also told a very sad statistic a few years back when the company I worked for at the time was supporting a company wide half marathon challenge. Apparently if you are over thirty and "walk vigorously" three times a week for twenty minutes at a time, that puts you within the top 5% of the population for your age group "athletically" ... Oh, and as you get older, those three walks put you progressively into a higher and higher percentile ... Very, very sad ...

 

[rhubroma]

Ironically in America the poor are proportionally fatter then the rich, because many ghetto familys can feed themselves cheaper at KFC and McDonalds than they can at the supermarket.

The entire industrial-fast food model is to blame and it has begun to make inroads in Europe as well. We shouldn't worry so much about getting the most for our buck per se, but in eating well. Whereas the so called diet culture and its "solutions" is a myth.

A good example of what change needs to take place in the way humans eat in the modern industrialized era is Slow Food, an organization invented by the Italian sociologist Carlo Petrini in 1986. It was a reaction to the first McDs in Rome and thus against a dietary model that is bad for us and the environment. One of Petrini's theories is that society needs to espouse an agrarian and raising-fishing model which is based on peasant and traditional production-collection methods which emphasizes diversity and local environments rather than the concentration and over raising-fishing formula of the industrial methods.

 

[Spare Tyre]

Ironically in America the poor are proportionally fatter then the rich, because many ghetto familys can feed themselves cheaper at KFC and McDonalds than they can at the supermarket.

The entire industrial-fast food model is to blame and it has begun to make inroads in Europe as well. We shouldn't worry so much about getting the most for our buck per se, but in eating well. Whereas the so called diet culture and its "solutions" is a myth.

A good example of what change needs to take place in the way humans eat in the modern industrialized era is Slow Food, an organization invented by the Italian sociologist Carlo Petrini in 1986. It was a reaction to the first McDs in Rome and thus against a dietary model that is bad for us and the environment. One of Petrini's theories is that society needs to espouse an agrarian and raising-fishing model which is based on peasant and traditional production-collection methods which emphasizes diversity and local environments rather than the concentration and over raising-fishing formula of the industrial methods.

The "Slow Food" movement is very trendy here. There is sometimes confusion, though, between people who understand what it is and people who think the phrase refers to cooking food slowly over a number of hours.

 

[ohiwa nz]

"the problem is widespread across the country, irrespective of race ... the principal problem in NZ is lifestyle (which includes diet)."

I agree with that totally. It's Pasifika, it's Maori, it's Pakeha ... sure, the problem's worse in some communities, but it's nationwide—and my perception is it seems to be rapidly getting worse. This survey gained a reasonable amount of publicity here in NZ, largely focused on the fact nearly a quarter (if I recall correctly) of our kids are overweight or obese. Sad facts. In my view it's time to put serious limits on junk food advertising and to modify the GST (goods and services taxation) regime to help make selected healthy foods comparatively cheaper. Hell, we're a world leader in producing milk, yet sugar loaded soda drinks are half the price....

 

[The Mann]

No. According to my boss' wife (who is an epidemiologist) the problem is widespread across the country, irrespective of race. While some races are more genetically predisposed to being overweight, the principal problem in NZ is lifestyle (which includes diet).

The ranking makes sense, as the country kids itself about being "sporty", but we have one of the highest car ownership rates in the world and average annual usage that is higher than a lot of larger countries (which, by definition, indicates high frequency of use since we can't do 2000km road trips and the like). Also, do some food label reading and see how much added sugar there is in our food - even when you wouldn't think it's necessary (eg., chilli beans). Add to that the average Kiwi's meat consumption (and the way that most Kiwi's eat it), and it's starting to make sense ...

I was also told a very sad statistic a few years back when the company I worked for at the time was supporting a company wide half marathon challenge. Apparently if you are over thirty and "walk vigorously" three times a week for twenty minutes at a time, that puts you within the top 5% of the population for your age group "athletically" ... Oh, and as you get older, those three walks put you progressively into a higher and higher percentile ... Very, very sad ...

Thanks for that.

Yes the car usage rate here is atrocious, but I am still surprised we score so high as I personally, really don't see much obesity around. I'm probably just out of the loop. Pretty sad reading.

 

[Fowsto Cope-E]

English-speaking countries are doing pretty well-6 of the top 8

 

[ingsve]

One big change in the last 50-100 years is that a much smaller part of a population live off their own food. Almost everyone buys their food from others. What this means is that food consumption is closely tied to market forces. The sellers need to continually get higher profits just like any other company and the only real way to have a higher profit is to sell more food. Because of this the developement will naturally go towards more fat, sugar and salt in the food as well as more ready to eat products etc to further increase demand.

 

[fatandfast]

Ironically in America the poor are proportionally fatter then the rich, because many ghetto familys can feed themselves cheaper at KFC and McDonalds than they can at the supermarket.

The entire industrial-fast food model is to blame and it has begun to make inroads in Europe as well. We shouldn't worry so much about getting the most for our buck per se, but in eating well. Whereas the so called diet culture and its "solutions" is a myth.

A good example of what change needs to take place in the way humans eat in the modern industrialized era is Slow Food, an organization invented by the Italian sociologist Carlo Petrini in 1986. It was a reaction to the first McDs in Rome and thus against a dietary model that is bad for us and the environment. One of Petrini's theories is that society needs to espouse an agrarian and raising-fishing model which is based on peasant and traditional production-collection methods which emphasizes diversity and local environments rather than the concentration and over raising-fishing formula of the industrial methods.

I live in an area that has a great range of incomes and I have seen this 1st hand. Just recently lots of farmers markets have started accepting food stamps/benefit cards. In some areas the delis/bodegas don't have any fresh food..not kidding nothing fresh, not even a banana or an apple.There are no grocery stores.. I made my friends kid a chicken sandwich and he said it was almost as good as the frozen kind. This is going to take a generation or two to undo

 

[DAOTEC]

Bahrain has the fattest girls in the World

The Sun tabloid, quoting the countries with the fattest girls. And Bahrain tops the lot.

Here is that list: Countries with most overweight girls:

1. Bahrain 42.4% (with BMI over 25)
2. USA 36%
3. Portugal 34.3%
4. Spain 32%
5. Kuwait 31.8%
6. Australia 30%
7. New Zealand 30%
8. England 29.3%
9. Bolivia 27.5%
10. Sweden 27.4%

Related: [http://thesun.co.uk/news-Sep-27/Too-fat-Hooters-sacked.html]

 

[rhubroma]

One big change in the last 50-100 years is that a much smaller part of a population live off their own food. Almost everyone buys their food from others. What this means is that food consumption is closely tied to market forces. The sellers need to continually get higher profits just like any other company and the only real way to have a higher profit is to sell more food. Because of this the developement will naturally go towards more fat, sugar and salt in the food as well as more ready to eat products etc to further increase demand.

It just goes to show you that when the capitalist-market rules model is applied to litteraly everything in our lives, including how we have been conditioned to buy and consume food, we die sooner.

It's as if we have gone from being killed by famine, to slowly killing ourselves from eating poorly and too much through all the diseases caused by it. We have thus gone beyond the real benefits of producing more food, because the industry has conditioned/forced us to buy in larger quantities at a cheaper price (following the logic of the market) than is at all healthy for our organism - and stuff that isn't very fresh and loaded with sodium and preservatives or hormones. Take this and add the commercial advertising directed to adults and especially children of often low-income families not capable of buying "well" that which gets put on the table to eat, and you have the disastrous dietary situation in which much of the Western World presently finds itself. This while tons and tons of food gets dumped annually in the garbage within this market system in the developed world, while the Third World continues to starve.

I'd say we should certainly be able to do better, if the politcal-industrial infrastructure weren't in the way of making more common sense choices that are better for us and the planet in regards to food production and consumtion. This is what Slow Food has attempted to discredit and offer a viable alternative to, which has, at times, risked having it branded as a "radical -sheek" or "new-age" -yuppie farming fad by some with vested interests in the opposite direction, which, of course, could not be farther from the truth. A salient point Petrini makes is that whereas once, let's say, consumers used to buy 15 fish species among them several "less noble" types at market, now they by 5 "noble" types and that's it. Thus these 5 fish get over-fished which threatens to drive them into extinction, while the the alternative to going back to fishing with greater diversity and less concentration that would restabalize the biodiversity at sea is refused by the industry because more risky in terms of profit. The same could be said of the many fruit species driven into extinction because of the selective growing choices more convenient to the market "logic." Another salient point is his argument to go back to a small scale local production model used by peasant societies before industrialization, where possible, to ensure better quality without the need for so many preservatives and as a stimulus to the local economies that have litterally been destroyed by the mega-cooperatives, which, in addition, require much more chemicals and hormones in their way of industrial production that can't be good either for us or the envirenment.

Stuff to make you think...

 

[Anonymous]

Ironically in America the poor are proportionally fatter then the rich, because many ghetto familys can feed themselves cheaper at KFC and McDonalds than they can at the supermarket.

Pretty much the same in britain.

We have just moved from what, wasnt really a posh area, but food was important, lunch was a decent falafel or something from marks and spencers, we could go in any corner shop and get good quality food. Moved to the north east, and the shops are all budget food shops, high in fat, enumbers etc, the local shops sell what we would call poor food, tinned burgers etc. (we are actually having real problems eating here, there isnt even a greengrocer in the town.) the tow with a pop of about 2000 does however have SIX takeaways..
Very much a class/wealth issue.

(cant even get free range eggs in this town :/)

 

[Oldman]

Ironically in America the poor are proportionally fatter then the rich, because many ghetto familys can feed themselves cheaper at KFC and McDonalds than they can at the supermarket.

The entire industrial-fast food model is to blame and it has begun to make inroads in Europe as well. We shouldn't worry so much about getting the most for our buck per se, but in eating well. Whereas the so called diet culture and its "solutions" is a myth.

A good example of what change needs to take place in the way humans eat in the modern industrialized era is Slow Food, an organization invented by the Italian sociologist Carlo Petrini in 1986. It was a reaction to the first McDs in Rome and thus against a dietary model that is bad for us and the environment. One of Petrini's theories is that society needs to espouse an agrarian and raising-fishing model which is based on peasant and traditional production-collection methods which emphasizes diversity and local environments rather than the concentration and over raising-fishing formula of the industrial methods.

Went to an NFL game yesterday in Seattle, allegedly a fitter, better educated US city. Our seats where very high up and required alot of climbing and still cost $80/seat. Nothing about the amount of excercise (to get to the seats) or cost of attendance changed the fact that well over 50% of the fans were fat. Attending a MSL Soccer match had a completely different fan profile of 20-30 hipster wannabes and they were much, much thinner.
I got no answer.

 

[slowoldman]

American society is pathetic when it comes to diet and exercise (I can't speak to the others mentioned). I had numerous discussions at the beach this summer with friends. Young people are obese and proud!! They have Big Belly Crew decals on their vehicles. Young women parade around the beach in bikinis with bellys hanging out. Their exercise consists of texting on their phones and playing on their video game consoles. A news story here in the States just reported that mens pants in a size 36" waist in three separate American shops actually measured 39" 39.5" and 41" respectively, just to make people feel good about themselves. (As if a 36" waist is fine in the first place!) All this garbage about "real" sized people, it is BS! Get active you lazy FAT people.

It's simple really, it's called personal responsibility and choices. Choose to exercise and not stuff so much food down your gullet. I refuse to blame capitalist/corporate models for peoples poor choices, it's laziness period. It takes effort to eat healthy and exercise. Simple math really, just burn as much or more than you consume.

 

[kielbasa]

The fact that the "the poor" (I dispute the modern definition of that) in developed countries eat at KFC/McDonald's is a testament to their lack of discipline, not poverty. So let's call it like it is and not blame capitalism. Sadly, capitalism also caters to anyone willing to be catered to, whether it's bad food or pornography, but no one is holding a gun to the consumer's head. The choice to consume is entirely the individual's. Making one's own healthy sandwich is still cheaper than buying fast food, so let's not use the moot point about how cheap fast food is. "The poor" in USA, etc. as a group are just fat and lazy. It's their choice, whether it's informed or not. We're not talking about the poor of our great grandparents, going hungry while waiting in line for employment, any employment. These people pay for DVD rentals and popcorn with their government handout money. That's hardly capitalism's fault. I will argue that the problem of obesity among "the poor" was non-existent until these free-market countries started to be highly "socialized". If anything, "the poor" are getting fat on the government dollar.

The bottom line is that obesity and poverty are polar opposites and anyone trying to associating one with the other is engaging in manipulation of public sentiments. Obesity among "the poor" always comes down to a lack of discipline. It takes discipline to stay fit, and it takes discipline to find and hold a job.

 

[broken chain]

My wife is currently in the hospital nursing a staph infection.
75% of the caregivers are overweight,and I mean OVERWEIGHT by a wide margin.Go figure

 

[BroDeal]

The fact that the "the poor" (I dispute the modern definition of that) in developed countries eat at KFC/McDonald's is a testament to their lack of discipline, not poverty. So let's call it like it is and not blame capitalism. Sadly, capitalism also caters to anyone willing to be catered to, whether it's bad food or pornography, but no one is holding a gun to the consumer's head. The choice to consume is entirely the individual's. Making one's own healthy sandwich is still cheaper than buying fast food, so let's not use the moot point about how cheap fast food is. "The poor" in USA, etc. as a group are just fat and lazy. It's their choice, whether it's informed or not. We're not talking about the poor of our great grandparents, going hungry while waiting in line for employment, any employment. These people pay for DVD rentals and popcorn with their government handout money. That's hardly capitalism's fault. I will argue that the problem of obesity among "the poor" was non-existent until these free-market countries started to be highly "socialized". If anything, "the poor" are getting fat on the government dollar.

I am glad someone still has faith in capitalism after the economic disaster that was created by blind free capiltalists whose faith in their system rivaled the religious fervor of a Southern television evangelist. The communists still have the North Koreans, and capitalism has you.

The bottom line is that obesity and poverty are polar opposites and anyone trying to associating one with the other is engaging in manipulation of public sentiments. Obesity among "the poor" always comes down to a lack of discipline. It takes discipline to stay fit, and it takes discipline to find and hold a job.

Indeed! I wholeheartedly concur, Sir. It is all the fault of those shiftless, lazy brown people. Why if they had the good sense and discipline that we white folks here at the country club have, I reckon most of their problems would go away, including obesity. Would you be kind enough to pass me another mint julep?