More than 73% of Americans are overweight or obese.

Obesity is like smoking. You make a choice to do both.

Now, if you think there is ANY movement towards health and fitness look at the latest trends on the magazine covers... full of hugely fat women.

My wife's last Athleta catalogue had nothing huge fat girls on the front. It was disgusting.

It's not politically correct to talk about how unhealthy it is nor how much more of a risk you are to having really bad side effects from COVID. Everyone is worried they'll be called out for "fat shaming" and of course.. racism (because when they don't like something they ALWAY tie it back to that).

YersiniaPestis wrote:

Obesity is like smoking. You make a choice to do both.

Now, if you think there is ANY movement towards health and fitness look at the latest trends on the magazine covers... full of hugely fat women.

My wife's last Athleta catalogue had nothing huge fat girls on the front. It was disgusting.

It's not politically correct to talk about how unhealthy it is nor how much more of a risk you are to having really bad side effects from COVID. Everyone is worried they'll be called out for "fat shaming" and of course.. racism (because when they don't like something they ALWAY tie it back to that).

100% agree. I'm with Bill Maher on this one, we need some good old fashioned fat shaming. Because part of changing behavior relates to shame.

just big boned wrote:

seattle prattle wrote:

Wrong.

Not wrong at all. The obese do cost less compared to the healthy once you factor in the longer lives of the healthy and diseases they tend to have in their later years.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2225433/

Your answer, while technically correct, ignores the considerably greater impact of the decreased productivity due to obesity. This issue wasmentioned in that same article.

I watch the Trump rallies and it is akin to a Weight Watchers march.

OP - king wrote:

I watch the Trump rallies and it is akin to a Weight Watchers march.

They also drive giant, expensive trucks. How do they even afford those things?

Yes, I agree, BMI is really flawed and is rubbish for example for really tall people.

If you see a man at BMI 20 who is 5'5 and one who is 6'5 the 6'5 one will look ill. It is not the same.

It shouldn't really be to the power of 2, it should be to the power of 2.72 (that is a guess, I did work it out one time but can't remember).

You are not severely obese or obese or anything remotely similar to that.

I suppose you are saying that it isn't 52% that are severely obese or obese, it may be 40% or something, but look around, it is a lot of people either way.

Re 2.72, You are basically correct. There have been articles on this. But my recollection is 2.7 or 2.6(depending on situation. I think 2.7 is probably the best for most situations we would encounter. I think the view was

A) People are going to have a hard time using an exponent with a decimal

B) If they were going to be off by a bit, the politics would be more challenging to use three than 2 so they went with two.

It is a bit interesting, I was in the lecture addressing obesity and I made known my concerns about the exponent to with regards to BMI(because if you look at people it is apparent and intuitively our volume is based on 3 dimensions). The presenters stated that BMI as is equally correlated to health outcomes regardless of height, when the correct info on exponents was already out there.

This article references 2.5 as an exponent. I think yours is better, but both are better than what we use now.

https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/255712#Is-it-too-simple

?

OK, that is really interesting. It is evident it is not to the power of two. They need a better measure than BMI. It is really out. Even visually, it's so obvious it's a crock when you compare people. Thanks trashcan.

water in the forest wrote:

Yes, I agree, BMI is really flawed and is rubbish for example for really tall people.

If you see a man at BMI 20 who is 5'5 and one who is 6'5 the 6'5 one will look ill. It is not the same.

It shouldn't really be to the power of 2, it should be to the power of 2.72 (that is a guess, I did work it out one time but can't remember).

You are not severely obese or obese or anything remotely similar to that.

I suppose you are saying that it isn't 52% that are severely obese or obese, it may be 40% or something, but look around, it is a lot of people either way.

Your series of posts are accurate and reasonable. And it's true, there IS an obesity problem going on, even if BMI metrics (as it currently is used) skew the exact numbers on the issue. Totally in agreement.

I don't have as clear an opinion about HOW that issue is addressed, or if it even CAN be addressed in a "macro" sense. I just know I LOATHE how the general reporting on the issue is so continually flippant with its BMI usage when it seems so clearly flawed. Which, to me, seems indicative of how complicated the issue is and how unlikely we are to "solve" it.

Generally, the view that "people just need to eat less" is just about the most obvious and simple answer there is. But here in the U.S.? Virtually NO ONE is going to just "eat less". Achieving that would require such a severe cultural shift that, outside of a war, a famine, or something of the like, I don't see how the norms and mores would/will change to make any meaningful difference.

I mean. Fixing the BMI or its usage isn't even going to happen. Let alone cultural wide obesity reduction.

I think I am going mad, because I just read that as inaccurate and unreasonable and was about to argue with you!

I have no idea how it can be changed. Supermarkets are going to sell what sells obviously and what is popular. That isn't really healthy food. The food can be designed to be utterly delicious (well, after a while, it tastes horrible at first) and leave people craving more. Of course, you can go against all of that, but a lot of people aren't going to.

You are right that 'BMI' and measurements don't really matter, you basically know if your weight is too high for your height or not and if you are eating chit.