The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention published new data Tuesday showing that, after decades of obesity rates increasing in the United States, the rates look to have leveled off in the past decade: Since 2003, adult waistlines have stayed pretty much the same size. That’s good news, in terms of a troubling trend slowing. But it’s not great news: There are still 78 million Americans, about 35.7 percent of the adult population, that are obese.
Why the obesity rates have stayed constant is difficult for researchers to say. Some point to the growth of public health interventions, like bans on vending machines in schools ormandating recess for younger children. Health insurance companies have also gotten more aggressive in using wellness interventions and offering weight loss programs. Those changes, however, have been relatively recent, and its unlikely that they would surface in this data set.
If these kind of policies are working, why isn’t the country’s obesity rate slowing, rather than just holding flat? Time magazine’s Alice Park suggests that it might be too early to see results from relatively-recent obesity interventions. She points to anti-smoking efforts, which launched in earnest in the 1950s. It took until the 1960s to see serious results, and a notable decline in the country’s smoking rates...
No comments:
Post a Comment