WE’RE HUGE
U.S. obesity rate swells to a record 31%
AMERICANS ARE fatter than ever.
Nearly one in three is obese — the most troubling rate since the Centers for Disease Control began reporting on the national waistline in 1997.
“It deals with society as a whole and it is very hard to fix it,” said Dr. Ajay Goyal, chief of bariatric surgery at Overlook Medical Center in Summit, N.J.
When the CDC first conducted the survey, just 19.4% of adults 20 and older were obese. That number jumped to 30.6% in 2015, the agency’s latest report shows.
The actual number of overweight Americans is likely even higher because the 26,000 people surveyed provided their height and weight themselves.
Obesity brings increased risks of most chronic diseases, especially diabetes, heart disease and cancer, said Kim Robien, a George Washington University professor.
Goyal blamed “the big big industry of soda production and fast foods” and its “strong lobbyists,” but other experts took a broader view, pointing out that technology has made
Americans more sedentary, especially in the workplace, and we are workingg longerg hours.
“Obesity i is the numb ber one prev ventable c cause of d death in this c country,” s said Goyal. ““And it overt took cigar rette smoki ing two y years ago.”
The government defines obesity as a Body Mass Index over 30. Body mass can be determined by dividing one’s weight in pounds by height in inches squared times 703.
For example, a 5-foot-5 person who weighs 180 pounds and a 6-foot-1 person at 227 pounds have 30 BMI.
The “normal” range is 18.5 to 24.9.
The federal report also breaks down obesity in various groups: l Men and women between 20 and 39 have similar rates of obesity (26.7%), but between ages 40 and 59, 36% of women and 33.5% men are obese. l Black women were most likely to be obese, with a rate of 45.2%, followed by Hispanic women at 33.8% and non-Hispanic white women at 27.7%. l The obesity rate for black men is 34.5%, compared with non-Hispanic white men (30.3%) and Hispanic men (31%).