This was actually a really interesting article to read....long, but definitely good. 
Link
Its a bitter truth to swallow: About every fourth person on Earth is too fat. Obesity is fast becoming one of the worlds leading reasons why people die.
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Now a new enemy is emerging in the 21st century our appetite. Around the globe, about 1.7 billion people should lose weight, according to the International Obesity Task Force. Of those who are overweight, about 312 million are obese at least 30 pounds over their top recommended weight.
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Few nations are immune
Certainly the United States home of the Whopper and the Super Big Gulp remains a nation of scale-busters, with two of every three Americans overweight.
But there are a dozen places even worse:
South Pacific islands like Tonga, Kosrae and Nauru, where traditional meals of reef fish and taro are replaced by cheap instant noodles and deep-fried turkey tails.
Greece, birthplace of the Olympic Games, where the Mediterranean diet is as much a relic as the Parthenon.
Oil-soaked Kuwait where Mercedes-driving mothers draped in black burqas feed french fries to their children while shopping for $375 giraffe-leather Italian loafers.
China's burgeoning waistlines
Soon China will be the worlds biggest country in more ways than sheer population, experts predict. Its a stunning reversal from the Mao Zedong era when as many as 40 million people starved in the Great Leap Forward famine of 1958-61.
When university student Li Guangxu was a baby, rice was rationed. Now he eats cookies for breakfast.
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I compare the propensity to eat as somewhere between the propensity to breathe and the propensity to have sex, said Stephen Bloom, chief of metabolic medicine at the University of Londons Imperial College. Just saying, Stop eating! doesnt work. Its much worse than stopping smoking.
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In Mexico, 40 percent of its 105 million people live in poverty. Yet two-thirds of men and women there are overweight or obese.
In the slums of Sao Paulo, Brazil, 30 percent of the schoolchildren in 500 poor families have stunted growth due to poor diet. Yet, reports the Pan American Health Organization, about 6 percent of the children and 9 percent of the adults were obese, too. In southern Africa, Zambia, which experienced a food crisis in 2002, reports that 10 percent to 15 percent of urban schoolchildren are obese.
Its a myth that you cant have poverty and obesity coexisting, said Tufts University nutritionist Bea Rogers.
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Nutritionists say more and cheaper sugar is another factor, despite the industrys strenuous denials.
James E. Tillotson, director of Tufts Universitys Food Policy Institute, calculates the average American drinks the equivalent of a 55-gallon drum of soda every year, compared to 20 gallons of sweetened beverages a year in 1970.
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A lot of chief executives are really in a state of shock right now, said international nutrition expert Andrew Prentice of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Theyve produced this stuff, cheaper and cheaper, feeding the world. All of a sudden, were saying, Stop doing this!
****
With such low activity levels, as little as 100 extra calories a day translates into 10 pounds in a year.
Physical activity is not on the front burner in many peoples minds, said Stephen Blair, research director at the Cooper Institute of Aerobics Research in Dallas.
****
Link
Its a bitter truth to swallow: About every fourth person on Earth is too fat. Obesity is fast becoming one of the worlds leading reasons why people die.
****
Now a new enemy is emerging in the 21st century our appetite. Around the globe, about 1.7 billion people should lose weight, according to the International Obesity Task Force. Of those who are overweight, about 312 million are obese at least 30 pounds over their top recommended weight.
****
Few nations are immune
Certainly the United States home of the Whopper and the Super Big Gulp remains a nation of scale-busters, with two of every three Americans overweight.
But there are a dozen places even worse:
South Pacific islands like Tonga, Kosrae and Nauru, where traditional meals of reef fish and taro are replaced by cheap instant noodles and deep-fried turkey tails.
Greece, birthplace of the Olympic Games, where the Mediterranean diet is as much a relic as the Parthenon.
Oil-soaked Kuwait where Mercedes-driving mothers draped in black burqas feed french fries to their children while shopping for $375 giraffe-leather Italian loafers.
China's burgeoning waistlines
Soon China will be the worlds biggest country in more ways than sheer population, experts predict. Its a stunning reversal from the Mao Zedong era when as many as 40 million people starved in the Great Leap Forward famine of 1958-61.
When university student Li Guangxu was a baby, rice was rationed. Now he eats cookies for breakfast.
****
I compare the propensity to eat as somewhere between the propensity to breathe and the propensity to have sex, said Stephen Bloom, chief of metabolic medicine at the University of Londons Imperial College. Just saying, Stop eating! doesnt work. Its much worse than stopping smoking.
****
In Mexico, 40 percent of its 105 million people live in poverty. Yet two-thirds of men and women there are overweight or obese.
In the slums of Sao Paulo, Brazil, 30 percent of the schoolchildren in 500 poor families have stunted growth due to poor diet. Yet, reports the Pan American Health Organization, about 6 percent of the children and 9 percent of the adults were obese, too. In southern Africa, Zambia, which experienced a food crisis in 2002, reports that 10 percent to 15 percent of urban schoolchildren are obese.
Its a myth that you cant have poverty and obesity coexisting, said Tufts University nutritionist Bea Rogers.
****
Nutritionists say more and cheaper sugar is another factor, despite the industrys strenuous denials.
James E. Tillotson, director of Tufts Universitys Food Policy Institute, calculates the average American drinks the equivalent of a 55-gallon drum of soda every year, compared to 20 gallons of sweetened beverages a year in 1970.
****
A lot of chief executives are really in a state of shock right now, said international nutrition expert Andrew Prentice of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Theyve produced this stuff, cheaper and cheaper, feeding the world. All of a sudden, were saying, Stop doing this!
****
With such low activity levels, as little as 100 extra calories a day translates into 10 pounds in a year.
Physical activity is not on the front burner in many peoples minds, said Stephen Blair, research director at the Cooper Institute of Aerobics Research in Dallas.
****
