NPR opened my eyes this morning. I always knew obesity was an issue in the west. From Australia to the US (we are duking it out for who is the fattest nation per capita) obesity is an epidemic with massive implications for our future.
But this piece this morning re-dimensionalised it for me. It's an audio file so throw on the headphones.
Some snippets from what I heard:
"We have framed obesity as, "those people over there" who are heavy. What is missing is the recognition that the population as a whole is heavier and getting heavier".
"Weight, not just population size, should be taken into account when planning how to deal with increasing pressure on resources."
"The US makes up 6% of the global population but 30% of the world's weight"
"If you took the BMI (Body Mass Index) of America and applied it to the world's population, there would be an extra billion peoples worth of weight"
This is not a crack at America. We Aussies are just as fat. Interestingly the data shown here said that Arab countries were way up there too on the obesity scale. The research showed a correlation between cheap oil and obesity. Hopefully the text of the interview will also be published.
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