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Obesity and Overweight Prevalence for the U.S

cdc.gov

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Re: Obesity and Overweight Prevalence for the U.S

#221

Post by nsxwolf »

wutbrodo wrote: post #160
minikites wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Vegetables have very few calories. Look at the cost per calorie: http://www.mymoneyblog.com/what-does-200-calories-cost-the-e... Broccoli is $2.93 per 200 Calories. Doritos are 39 cents per 200 calories. That's the issue.

I don't think access to raw calories is the problem here, given that we're talking about people being _overweight_. Broccoli provides considerably more satiety per calorie than Doritos, to say nothing of the difference in healthfulness.

You could raise the price of Doritos to be higher than broccoli and overweight people will still choose the Doritos.

Source: Me

Re: Obesity and Overweight Prevalence for the U.S

#222

Post by always_good »

chefandy wrote: post #206
lobster_johnson wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm curious about this. I lived in a predominantly Latino (mostly Puerto Rican) neighborhood of Brooklyn for a while a couple of years back. The supermarkets were full of fresh, cheap food, yet the customers (who were consistently overweight and often obese, including the kids) were piling their shopping carts up with terrible stuff -- sugary cereals (Froot Loops etc.), sugary drinks (sodas, fruit juices, Caprisun, i…

Definitely seems odd on its face, but if you dig into it, you'll see that it's SO much more complex than simple access. Other factors include, but are certainly not limited to: Time to prepare: fresh foods generally take a lot longer, and a lot more effort to prepare than processed foods. When you've got each available parent working two jobs then this is a huge barrier. Knowledge of preparation: especially in immigr…

> Fussy Kids: people who appeasing fussy kids (yeah yeah yeah... the hardos without kids will say you should just force them to eat it. Life isn't so straightforward.)

My friends with children basically fall into two camps: one camp that agrees with you and blames their kids, and the other camp that just feeds their kids healthy food because, like your pet dog or cat, can't drive to the grocery store when it refuses to eat its croquetas.

Spending time with the families of my friends, the real issue seems to be with the adults either giving in to their children because they don't want to bother, feeding their children boxed food because they don't have the energy, or feeding their children bad food because they themselves don't eat much healthy food.

Re: Obesity and Overweight Prevalence for the U.S

#223

Post by woodandsteel »

zaroth wrote: post #141
adrr wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Healthy food isn't expensive. You can buy chicken breast for $3 to $5 a pound. You can buy a head of lettuce for $2. Oatmeal is dirt cheap. Most vegetables are less than $3 a pound.

It may be true that these ingredients are available in certain markets for those prices, but that isn't accounting for a significant portion of the true overall cost of healthful eating. Healthy food tends to spoil, and if you're not able to go shopping multiple times a week and have unpredictable availability for meal preparation, you're going to see a lot of spoilage. If 30% of your fresh produce ultimately spoils,…

>Healthy food tends to spoil, and if you're not able to go shopping multiple times a week and have unpredictable availability for meal preparation, you're going to see a lot of spoilage. If 30% of your fresh produce ultimately spoils, your actual cost is 43% higher.

That's not at all true. I eat healthy, lots of vegetables, beans, lean meat,and so on, and I go shopping only once every two weeks. Apples keep for weeks, ditto cauliflower in the refrigerator, kale, cabbage, tomatoes, and so on. Meat you can freeze. Dry beans keep forever, and plus there is canned goods.Plus flavorings like salsa in a jar. I waste virtually nothing.

And it is cheaper than living off of processed foods, unless you are living off of pure starches like macaroni and cookies.

You do know have to know how to cook. Nothing fancy, just the basics like boiling beans, chopping vegetables, mixing together a bunch of things to get something that tastes reasonably good. And it does take time.

Re: Obesity and Overweight Prevalence for the U.S

#224

Post by nsxwolf »

protonimitate wrote: post #45
3pt14159 wrote: post #8

This is directly related to the way American cities are designed. It’s a car centric culture where big houses are far away from each other. That means driving everywhere. That means long commutes. That means TV over communal activity. That means big grocery runs with shelf stable food. Then pile on hyper sweet drinks and nutritional misinformation campaigns, and of course Americans are going to be overweight. The wor…

While I agree American cities don't promote the most healthy lifestyles, it's not like city-dwelers are less healthy or more obese on average than those who live in the country. You're spot on with your second paragraph though. There is a lot of misinformation about nutrition, dieting, and food in general, and it's all aimed at one goal: turning a profit. Sugar is one of the major culprits, but over eating in general…

> It's really that simple.

Everything you list is simple, but nearly impossible for most people to stick with for life. It's not a matter of education, it's the fact that implementing that plan is physically and emotionally painful and wears most people down inside of a week or two.

Re: Obesity and Overweight Prevalence for the U.S

#225

Post by smoothgrips »

izietto wrote: post #20
3pt14159 wrote: post #8

This is directly related to the way American cities are designed. It’s a car centric culture where big houses are far away from each other. That means driving everywhere. That means long commutes. That means TV over communal activity. That means big grocery runs with shelf stable food. Then pile on hyper sweet drinks and nutritional misinformation campaigns, and of course Americans are going to be overweight. The wor…

I'm italian and I visited united states a couple of months ago. In my opinion the biggest problem is that you don't have decent food at affordable prices. Healthy food has nonsensical high prices and if you want something at a human price you don't have much choice except fast food. What a shame.

> I'm italian and I visited united states a couple of months ago. In my opinion the biggest problem is that you don't have decent food at affordable prices. Healthy food has nonsensical high prices and if you want something at a human price you don't have much choice except fast food. What a shame.

We recently just spent a week in Spain. We went to the grocery store and bought a whole cart full of food for like 20 euros. I was blown away. The equivalent amount of food in the US would have easily been like 100 dollars, probably more.

Re: Obesity and Overweight Prevalence for the U.S

#226

Post by Kevin_S »

codedokode wrote: post #149

I think it is important to diffirentiate between people who are born with overweight body and cannot do anything with it and people who would have normal weight but are gaining it because of unhealthy food or lifestyle. Sadly, the page doesn't have such a table.

As I understand it, the idea that people are "naturally" overweight and cannot change that is a complete myth with no scientific backing.

In some cases, certain diseases/medications can cause a very small weight gain but nothing significant.

Re: Obesity and Overweight Prevalence for the U.S

#227

Post by woodandsteel »

smn1234 wrote: post #218
zaroth wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It may be true that these ingredients are available in certain markets for those prices, but that isn't accounting for a significant portion of the true overall cost of healthful eating. Healthy food tends to spoil, and if you're not able to go shopping multiple times a week and have unpredictable availability for meal preparation, you're going to see a lot of spoilage. If 30% of your fresh produce ultimately spoils,…

you're suggesting that humanity has historically had easier access to healthy (fresh) food as they went shopping multiple times a week? I doubt this. What makes you think there was improved transportation options or significant amount of free time ?

Either they lived in a city with multiple food stands and stores within walking distance, or they lived on a farm and grew it themselves.

Re: Obesity and Overweight Prevalence for the U.S

#228

Post by samsonradu »

izietto wrote: post #20
3pt14159 wrote: post #8

This is directly related to the way American cities are designed. It’s a car centric culture where big houses are far away from each other. That means driving everywhere. That means long commutes. That means TV over communal activity. That means big grocery runs with shelf stable food. Then pile on hyper sweet drinks and nutritional misinformation campaigns, and of course Americans are going to be overweight. The wor…

I'm italian and I visited united states a couple of months ago. In my opinion the biggest problem is that you don't have decent food at affordable prices. Healthy food has nonsensical high prices and if you want something at a human price you don't have much choice except fast food. What a shame.

Same here, I was chasing asian street food for breakfast. From my touristy experience US breakfasts consist of no vegetables and all sorts of sweets.

Re: Obesity and Overweight Prevalence for the U.S

#229

Post by izietto »

ghaff wrote: post #191
izietto wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I partially agree with you guys substaining that there were cheap healthy things, but for my experience they were exceptions. I could find very rarely vegetables at affordable price and at decent quality together. Or they were cheap, or they were decent. And a head of lettuce at 2$ is a high price. As exceptions examples, avocados were good and cheap.

>avocados were good and cheap Maybe in California. Certainly not in the eastern US. Canned vegetables are usually not very nutritious but a lot of frozen vegetables are pretty cheap year-round as well.

You're right, California, Nevada and Arizona, I visited the west coast.

Re: Obesity and Overweight Prevalence for the U.S

#230

Post by Bartweiss »

yodsanklai wrote: post #128
dexwiz wrote: post #95

These numbers aren’t shocking. Many people are “casually” fat, meaning they carry an extra 30-40lbs around their gut. Probably accumulated slowly by 2-3lbs a year. They don’t fit the classic image of an obese person but they are obese according to BMI. I moved to SF which is a relatively fit city. Going back home in the Midwest I am shocked by the number of people who are overweight. Fat is normalized there. It wasn’…

As a non-american, I'm wondering how a fit person is considered in the midwest? Is it seen as a good trait or rather something odd?

It's not necessarily odd - obesity rates are high, but not so high that a healthy weight is exceptional. Being generally muscular or trim isn't a negative, and probably isn't going to get anyone dismissed as a fitness nut.

That said, an average to low-normal BMI can certainly get comments. I'm smack in the middle of the healthy BMI range, and not exceptionally muscular or anything else that would distort that. Living in and visiting friends in flyover country I get comments like "you're too skinny", "you need to eat more", and so on. No one is particularly judging me, there's just a shifted sense of average where BMI ~21 feels like the low end of the range.

(And of course they're not exactly wrong; eating Midwestern food and living in a driving-centric suburb had the predictable effect on my weight, so on some level thinner people there are behaving unusually.)

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