Part II: Speed
Obesity in America Healthier, not healthy Jan 21st 2014, 17:19 by C.H. | NEW YORK
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THE overweight American, slurping a bucket of soda in his car, is an international stereotype. Thankfully, fewer Americans fit the mould. Obesity rates among adults were flat from 2011 to 2012 in every state but Arkansas. And obesity rates among poor young children declined in 18 states from 2008 to 2011. This month brought new data that may help explain why.
On January 8th 16 top food companies announced that they had fulfilled their promise to sell 1 trillion fewer calories in 2012 than they had in 2007. Indeed the companies surpassed their goal, reducing the number of calories by 6.4 trillion, according to an independent reviewfunded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, a respected health philanthropy. And on January 16th America’s agriculture department published a report showing that Americans are eating slightly more healthily. In 2010 American adults ate an average of 78 fewer calories each day than they had in 2005.
All this is promising news. The food companies’ announcement brought praise from the White House: “We are thrilled,” declared Sam Kass, the director of Michelle Obama’s “Let’s Move!” anti-obesity campaign.
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But there are a few clouds darkening this sunny picture. First, the detailed review of food companies’ pledge, conducted by Barry Popkin of the University of North Carolina, has yet to be published in a peer-reviewed journal. Second, Americans’ health is still abysmal.
In 1980 no state had an obesity rate higher than 15%, with obesity defined as a body-mass index of 30 or higher, 203 pounds for 5’9” man. Now every state has an obesity rate above 20%, and 13 have rates of 30% or higher. Meanwhile rates of extreme obesity, with a BMI of 40 or more, have risen for both adults and children. This matters. Those who are obese are more likely to develop diabetes, heart disease and other chronic ailments.
Worryingly, obesity rates are highest among the poor and uneducated, according to a towering stack of research. In the most recent addition to the pile, researchers from Harvard and INSEAD, writing in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, show that obesity rates declined among teenagers with college-educated parents, from 14% in 2003-4 to about 7% in 2009-10. Among teens with parents with only a high-school degree, obesity rates rose from 20% to 25%.
There remains the question of what to do about it. It is easy to cast food companies as villains. Much of what they sell is rubbish. Taxing sugary soda, which has no nutritional value, seems sensible. But food companies, and fast-food companies in particular, are only partly responsible. In a new study published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, Dr Popkin shows that unhealthy meals outside fast-food chains play a greater role in boosting obesity rates. The researchers at Harvard and INSEAD found that the main difference between the rich and poorer teens was not how much they ate but how much they exercised.
All this serves as a reminder of an important fact, well known but worth highlighting once more. Millions of Americans are ill thanks to factors that have nothing to do with the health system, from poverty to food marketing to poor urban planning to strapped school athletic programmes. Obamacare helps previously uninsured Americans afford treatment. Improving Americans’ health will take much more.
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Source:The Economist
http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2014/01/obesity-america
The Jobs With the Highest Obesity Rates By Olga Khazan March 31, 2014 11:00 AM
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Employers want their workers to be healthy—both for insurance-cost and humane reasons—but aspects of those very jobs can make workers sick. A study published this month in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine found that workers who toiled for more than 40 hours per week or were exposed to a hostile work environment were significantly more likely to be obese.
Both of those are fairly intuitive—long hours at the office can make it hard to squeeze in exercise, and dealing with, shall we say, “a strong personality” all day can make it tempting to indulge in an extra helping of curly fries. (A more tragic explanation would be that people who are already obese are more likely to be harassed at work.)
But surprisingly, the researchers also found that certain industries and occupations in and of themselves correlate with higher obesity rates, even when controlling for the demographic makeup of those jobs.
The study authors used data from the 2010 National Health Interview Survey and connected it to self-reported weight and height information, as well as industry and occupation codes from the Census. For the hostility factor, they asked workers: “During the past 12 months were you threatened, bullied, or harassed by anyone while you were on the job?” (The obesity rate was 13 percent higher among those who said yes.)
Among the industry categories, manufacturing, healthcare/social assistance, transportation/warehousing, information, utilities, and public administration had the highest obesity rates:
Olga Khazan
Surprisingly, though, only the healthcare/social assistance and public administration industries had significantly higher-than-average obesity rates after the study authors adjusted for factors such as race, gender, and health behaviors like smoking.
"Public administration" means, roughly, bureaucrats in local, city, and federal offices. "Healthcare and social assistance" is anyone who works in a healthcare setting.
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This is a bit odd. It’s plausible that sitting behind some far-flung city hall desk might lead to weight gain; it’s more shocking that people who work in doctors’ offices suffer from high rates of obesity even as their workplaces preach healthy living.
From there, the researchers looked at actual job descriptions:
Olga Khazan
Protective service workers—cops, security guards, and jailers—had the highest obesity prevalence, at more than 40 percent. But again, only engineers, office administrators, and social-service workers had unusually high obesity rates after adjusting for the demographic and other factors.
In some ways, this chart simply represents a broad swathe of a country where one in three people are obese: “Engineering” is a pretty wide-ranging description, and the "office and admin" field encompasses everyone from bank tellers to receptionists.
But again, the “social service workers” category includes people working in counseling, mental health, and child protection—a.k.a. healthcare.
So why are people in healthcare jobs portlier than others? The authors think it could be because certain characteristics of those jobs—their sedentariness, for example—contributes to obesity. Doctors might be on their feet all day, but their receptionists and billing staff are glued to their desks, licking envelopes and answering phones.
But the researchers also bring up an interesting data point: An earlier National Health Interview Survey found that the occupational category “health services,” which includes lower-wage clerical staff, had a much higher obesity rate than so-called “health diagnosing” jobs, which comprise higher-earning roles like doctors and nurse-practitioners.
So, as with most trends that seem to co-occur with obesity, it might all just come down to income. Your job might affect your body, but it’s how much you earn, not where you work, that ultimately matters.
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Source:Yahoo Finance
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/jobs-highest-obesity-rates-150000939.html;_ylt=AwrBEiJ3OU9TNioAhfqTmYlQ
The economic cost of obesity Physical inactivity is costing billions. Author: Hanna Barry 14 March 2014 03:30
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Diabetes cost the global economy nearly $500 billion (R5.3 trillion) in 2010, with the figure projected to rise to at least $745 billion (R7.9 trillion) in 2030, notes a 2011 report by the World Economic Forum (WEF), and the Harvard School of Public Health.
Developing countries are increasingly taking on a much greater share of the outlays. “Nearly $300 billion of direct costs are expected to come from low- and lower-middle income countries, which will constitute 45% of all diabetes cases,” the report continues.
Shocking figures to say the least, yet it is perhaps even more astounding that obesity is considered the leading cause of type 2 diabetes (high blood sugar and insulin resistance). In other words, 90% of all cases of diabetes are preventable.
The WEF report reveals that over the next 20 years, non-communicable diseases (NCD) will cost more than $30 trillion, representing 48% of global GDP in 2010, and pushing millions of people below the poverty line.
Macroeconomic simulations suggest that cardiovascular disease, chronic respiratory disease, cancer, diabetes and poor mental health (most of which are often connected to an unhealthy lifestyle) will lead to a cumulative output loss of $47 trillion over the next two decades. This loss represented 74% of GDP in 2010. It also represents enough money to eradicate the $2-a-day poverty that 2.5 billion people have faced for more than half a century.
Cardiovascular disease, including heart disease and hypertension, cost the global economy $863 billion in 2010, accounting for 63% of all deaths, and this is estimated to rise to $1 044 billion in 2013, a 22% increase.
Just over half is attributed to direct healthcare costs, and the remaining 45% to productivity loss from disability or premature death, as well as time loss from work due to illness or the need to seek care. A staggering 80% of these deaths now occur in low- and middle-income countries.
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Coe: The biggest economic risk is physical inactivity
Former Olympic track and field champion, Lord Sebastian Coe, highlighted the costs of physical inactivity in his presentation at the recent Discovery Leadership Summit in Johannesburg.
Lord Coe, who chaired the 2012 London Summer Olympic and Paralympic Games, noted that physical inactivity was costing the US economy twice what it spends on its domestic healthcare budget. In 2011, the US spent 17.9% of its then $15.5-trillion GDP on health expenditure.
Coe said that the core ideology of the London Olympics was “To use the power of the games to transform the lives of young people”. “The games were, absolutely and unashamedly, for young people, especially to encourage them into sport and activity. There is no question to me that London is in a better position since it had the Games than it was before,” Coe said.
He stressed the need to think about how physical activity could be encouraged in cities, considering questions of personal safety, for instance, as some young people in the UK feared cycling or walking between burrows, due to gang rivalries.
Along these lines, the UK is currently undertaking a national audit of everything that is working well and not working well, in order to get people to move. The findings will be published in a paper entitled ‘Living Well, Working Well.’
Coe also made reference to the Laureus Sport for Good Foundation, connected to the Laureaus World Sports Academy, which raises funds to provide financial and practical support to more than 140 projects that use the power of sport to provide coaching and education to young people in some of the most challenging and deprived environments around the world.
“The biggest challenge that all economies face is physical inactivity,” Coe said.
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Source:Moneyweb
http://www.moneyweb.co.za/moneyweb-economic-trends/the-economic-cost-of-obesity
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