weight loss information

Obesity And Fast Foods - The Lethal Link


Obesity and fast foods - there's little doubt about the link. Obesity has reached epidemic proportions in the United states. And it's an epidemic that has grown side by side, step by step with the the fast food industry.

Eric Schlosser in his brilliant and shocking book, Fast Food Nation, describes the US as "an empire of fat," and he lays the blame for this clearly and convincingly at the door of the fast food industry.

Obesity Fast Food Data

Twice as many American adults are obese today as in the 1960s. More than half of all adults and a quarter of all children are now obese. Over this same period, fast food has become cheaper and easier to buy. Further evidence for the link between obesity and fast food can be found outside the US. Since the early 1980s, American-style fast food culture has spread like wildfire around the world... And obesity has followed, accompanied by its many unwelcome side effects: heart disease, diabetes, arthritis and other ills.

As people in countries like Japan and China have abandoned traditional healthy diets in favour of fast food, the rates of obesity and associated diseases have soared.

In countries which have resisted the spread of fast food culture, like France, Italy and Spain, obesity is far less of a problem. The good news is that there is now more awareness about the ill effects of fast food than ever before, thanks in part to books like Fast Food Nation and documentary movies like Morgan Spurlock's popular and punchy Super Size Me.

There also seems to be a genuine change in people's attituded to to food and how it is produced. As Schlosser says modestly of his book: "its success should not be attributed to my literary style, my storytelling ability, or the novelty of my arguments.

"Had the same book been published a decade ago, with the same words in the same order, it probably wouldn't have attracted much attention. Not just in the United States, but throughout western Europe,people are beginning to question the massive, homogenizing systems that produce, distribute, and market their food. The unexpected popularity of Fast Food Nation, I believe, has a simple yet profound explanation. The times are changing."

What can we do about fast food and obesity?

So what can we do to as consumers to tackle the problem of obesity and fast foods?

First, we can stop supporting the traditional, unhealthy fast food chains. Let's rather buy from outlets that sell healthy alternatives. More and more of these restaurants and delis are opening. There should be at least one near you. Support it!

Another thing we can do is to lobby our congressperson (or MP or some other political representative if we're in a country outside the US) to ban all advertisements that promote foods high in fat and sugar to children.

As Schlosser points out, prevention is far better than cure. "A ban on advertising unhealthy foods to children would discourage eating habits that are not only hard to break, but potentially life-threatening."

Such a ban may sound far-fetched, until you remember that 35 years ago a ban on cigarette advertising sounded equally unlikely. Five years later Congress banned cigarette ads from television and radio. And those ads were directed at adults, not children.

Smoking has declined ever since.

It's time we did something similar with obesity and fast food

Alan Cooper is a journalist with 20 year's experience and the publisher of http://www.ObesityCures.com, a site with the ambitious aim of being a "one-stop-shop" for impartial information on obesity and weight loss solutions - including fad diets, prescription weightloss pills and herbal diet aides.


MORE RESOURCES:

Weight-loss surgery won't "cure" sleep apnea
Reuters - 10 hours ago
By Megan Rauscher NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - In people who are obese, weight-loss surgery will likely lead to an improvement in obstructive sleep apnea ...


Weight loss may cut risk of colorectal growths
Reuters - 9 hours ago
Yamaji and colleagues investigated the relationship between obesity and the prevalence of colorectal polyps and studied the effect of weight loss on the ...


Examiner.com

Weight Loss Examiner
Examiner.com - 16 hours ago
These websites were picked by the Weight Loss Examiner as useful resources. Just because there's a storm brewing (OK, two!) in the tropics doesn't mean it's ...
Weight Loss Examiner Examiner.com
all 2 news articles


Fitness, Even without Weight Loss, Good for the Heart
13WHAM-TV, NY - 12 hours ago
A new study of 40000 women shows that even if women never drop an ounce--fitting in fitness seriously expands the capacity of your heart. ...


Slim Shots Helps with Portion Control, Most Effective Behavior for ...
PR Web (press release), WA - 21 hours ago
While changes in all 5 behaviors led to weight loss, decreased portion sizes resulted to the greatest weight loss. More important, 38% of the participants ...


Coastal Center for Obesity Offers Hispanics Weight Loss Surgery ...
PR Web (press release), WA - 21 hours ago
"Our mission is to improve access to weight loss surgery to those who need it most in the Hispanic community." BLIS is similar to the concept of a new car ...


BBC News

Weight loss summer camp ends
BBC News, UK - 21 hours ago
A group of children from West Yorkshire have reached the end of a summer camp designed to help them lose weight. The BBC is not responsible for the content ...


Joy Fit Club vets reveal weight-loss secrets
MSNBC - Aug 25, 2008
And while Bauer vacationed from the show, the trio of weight loss leaders happily took her place Monday to provide encouragement to others facing a battle ...


Mushrooms and weight loss
Los Angeles Times, CA - Aug 25, 2008
Far be it from us to pander to awareness-themed events, but did you know it's almost time for National Mushroom Month? As it happens, the journal Appetite ...


Healthy Inspirations LLC Consolidating Corporate Office to West Coast
MarketWatch - 9 hours ago
HiForLife.com for information about the Healthy Inspirations women's weight loss/fitness program. Healthy Inspirations is a healthy weight loss/fitness ...

Weight-Loss - Google News

home | site map
weightlossetc.net © 2006 - 2007 weight loss