Anyone who doesn't believe obesity is an issue in the US hasn't had the dubious pleasure of walking through Walmart on the weekend.
Seriously.
Anyone who doesn't believe obesity is an issue in the US hasn't had the dubious pleasure of walking through Walmart on the weekend.
Seriously.
No, it makes perfect sense that obesity in and of itself would increase risk of heart failure. The human heart is suited to supply a certain number of blood vessels over a certain area. The area and number of blood vessels go well over the adapted amount when a person becomes obese, so the heart has to hustle 24/7. Also, the whole added weight thing produces sheer stress on the body. This is a reason that fat people tend to get winded way faster. It takes much more force and energy to move that mass around. The pressure itself is condusive to heart attacks.
Isn't regular exertion of the heart a good thing for it? Isn't that why we do jogging, to get your heart pumping hard? In an obese person the heart has to pump blood further, therefore getting a "workout" without having to run miles? I think I heard this somewhere, that their heart can actually be strong and more prepared for later life, do you think that's a possibility?
EDIT: Also, even if they were in the same intervals, I wonder if exercise could ever simulate the effects of operating an obese body.
That makes me feel even more compassionate for them.
I have the notion that being compassionate toward someone who is obese would involve helping them lose weight. I tend to include among compassion a desire to keep people from debilitating and killing themselves.
EDIT: I ommit suicide in cases of extreme, uncurable pain, and things of that nature.
That extends to people of all sizes, I see people living unhealthy lifestyles of all sizes, so of course I would want to see them take better care of themselves but I won't assume that just because someone's BMI creeps over 30 that they're all of a sudden killing themselves (and weren't when they weighed a Kg less).
Contrary to popular beliefs... It's actually how much you eat and exercise as oppose to what you eat that leads to weight gain. Of course here in this case I'm not refering to cardiovascular diseases... for that you should avoid high salt and fatty diet. Refined carbs and sugars themselves don't tend to do much according to clinical RCTs. This only makes sense because the body can convert all forms of fats, carbs, proteins to simple sugar... and from simple sugar back into fat for storage. Complex starches are helpful mostly in diabetic patients with difficulties maintaining consistent blood glucose. Not so much for the rest of us.I would encourage an obese person to eat well (small amounts often and to avoid refined carbs and sugars), I would also encourage them to exercise regularly BUT if they did that and the weight still didn't fall off them, I wouldn't push them harder to lose the weight (especially if all other indicators of health were good). Anyway our attempts to "help" often does nothing more than exasperate the problem (or cause other ones).
See the problem here is not with the health officials... but rather how to explain something to the general public in the most effective manner to see results. Most people don't have the background in health science to understand nor are they willing to spend a lot of time find out about research findings. Instead they rely on the news. News only sells when its segmented into little spoonfuls, else the viewer/reader/listener gets bored and goes do something else.I have been thinking about this recently, I think that "weight loss" is actually used by public health officials as the carrot on the end of the stick to get people in general to eat less and exercise more, I think they know that the goal of being "slim and beautiful" is much more motivating than the goal of "reducing risk factors for health problems in the long term". I think that health officials have at times fallen on the side of idealogy and manipulation rather than honest informing of the facts.
Exactly! See, if we're still hunter and gatherers, then obesity will no longer be a problem. People are built for a more active lifestyle than what most of us are getting in the current day and age. Fat storage and our likes of sugars and fat is build for surviving periods of famine or starvation... since we don't have that any more... people become overweight.You can't get fat without eating the Calories and not using enough energy to get rid of them. Some people might be born with the habit of eating more and exercising less maybe. But body-wise, I'd think anything but lack of muscle to burn it wouldn't make much difference from person to person. I saw my friend drop 10kgs from just substituting Coke for sugar free Coke, and making sure Calories stayed within a certain range. He didn't even stop eating fast food or exercise. And similar things are probably where Americans get their obesity from. They probably think they won't eat food with fat, but then load up on sugar or something else. Like Coke can get you there on its own.
The BMI 30 is an arbitrary cutoff. Risk of cardiovascular disease is nearly as high with BMI of say 29.
Contrary to popular beliefs... It's actually how much you eat and exercise as oppose to what you eat that leads to weight gain. Of course here in this case I'm not refering to cardiovascular diseases... for that you should avoid high salt and fatty diet. Refined carbs and sugars themselves don't tend to do much according to clinical RCTs. This only makes sense because the body can convert all forms of fats, carbs, proteins to simple sugar... and from simple sugar back into fat for storage. Complex starches are helpful mostly in diabetic patients with difficulties maintaining consistent blood glucose. Not so much for the rest of us.
David Ludwig, the Harvard endocrinologist, says that it's the direct effect of insulin on blood sugar that does the trick. He notes that when diabetics get too much insulin, their blood sugar drops and they get ravenously hungry. They gain weight because they eat more, and the insulin promotes fat deposition. The same happens with lab animals. This, he says, is effectively what happens when we eat carbohydrates -- in particular sugar and starches like potatoes and rice, or anything made from flour, like a slice of white bread. These are known in the jargon as high-glycemic-index carbohydrates, which means they are absorbed quickly into the blood. As a result, they cause a spike of blood sugar and a surge of insulin within minutes. The resulting rush of insulin stores the blood sugar away and a few hours later, your blood sugar is lower than it was before you ate. As Ludwig explains, your body effectively thinks it has run out of fuel, but the insulin is still high enough to prevent you from burning your own fat. The result is hunger and a craving for more carbohydrates. It's another vicious circle, and another situation ripe for obesity.
See the problem here is not with the health officials... but rather how to explain something to the general public in the most effective manner to see results. Most people don't have the background in health science to understand nor are they willing to spend a lot of time find out about research findings. Instead they rely on the news. News only sells when its segmented into little spoonfuls, else the viewer/reader/listener gets bored and goes do something else.
So what is the most simplified thing you can tell people? Simply that obesity is bad news...
The best index is taking a body fat % measurement. The second I think is the correlation they found with waist to hip ratio. BMI is used because that's what people are most familiar with. There are cases when this might be inaccurate, but in general it fits. For obviously muscular/dense boned individuals... I think it's safe to say they're not obese. Remember the MBI is nothing more than a guideline. It's easy to measure, and it's been around for so long that to suddenly switch to something else is impractical. That's why it is still used.The whole thing is pretty arbitrary to me. I think an "unhealthiness epidemic" is much more accurate description than an "obesity epidemic", there are some very healthy and muscular individuals in the obese range, it is a scattergun rather than targeted approach. By obsessing about the obese we almost excuse all the unhealthy individuals in the other ranges by default.
Are you diabetic? As I said before... for most of us our bodies are very good at regulating blood glucose levels. So this is not an issue.What about the blood sugar spike that comes with eating refined carbs? I have heard that this spike disrupts signals to our brain and it basically shuts down the fat burning process.?
Actually, one of the main flaws in the scientific community is their lack in going out to educate the public and letting their research be known. They publish within scientific journals, attend conventions etc... but that's only sharing information with other scientists... those in the same/similar fields. None of this gets to the public unless the media finds research results which they can put a spin on.Something makes me uneasy about scientists manipulating rather than directly informing.
For obviously muscular/dense boned individuals... I think it's safe to say they're not obese.
A new study done by researchers at Wake Forest University School of Medicine shows that social stress could be an important precursor to heart disease by causing the body to deposit more fat in the abdominal cavity, speeding the harmful buildup of plaque in blood vessels, a stepping stone to the number one cause of death in the world.
This article is quite a revelation:
Social Stress Linked To Harmful Fat Deposits, Heart Disease
How much of the health problems correlated with obesity could be caused by the social stress of being obese? Could picking on fat people and being hysterical about their weight throughout their lives be actually causing the very problems people want to "save" them from?
For obviously muscular/dense boned individuals... I think it's safe to say they're not obese.
Conversely, a person with too low BMI may have a very small frame for their height. No one defends them though. If someone can be a bit overweight and still be healthy, then why not a bit underweight?
I also want to see where all these truly obese people who eat very healthy in moderate amounts and get adequate exercise are hiding :rolli:
I would defend them, but there isn't an "underweight" epidemic going on at the moment. Of course you can be underweight and healthy! Naturally underweight people shouldn't pe harassed and teased about "eating disorders" or have an arbitrary standard applied to them that doesn't consider their lifestyle. I will very much defend the naturally underweight.
So you're able to assess everyone's lifestlye are you? How do you find the time?