Obesity in America

 

 As scales across the country continue to rise, it becomes more and more clear that America is facing an obesity epidemic. In 2012, more than one third of children and adolescents were overweight or obese(http://www.cdc.gov/healthyyouth/obesity/facts.htm).  Obesity can lead to a variety of minor to severe health problems, including coronary heart disease, high blood pressure, stroke, and type 2 diabetes. Obesity can be very expensive to treat. "The estimated annual health care costs of obesity-related illness are a staggering $190.2 billion or nearly 21% of annual medical spending in the United States. Childhood obesity alone is responsible for $14 billion in direct medical costs." (http://www.healthycommunitieshealthyfuture.org/learn-the-facts/economic-costs-of-obesity/) This cost is likely to increase if obesity levels stay the same or continue to grow. The National Institutes of Health found that extreme cases of obesity may shorten life expectancy up to 14 years. This is a dramatic reduction in life expectancy compared with people of normal weight (http://www.nih.gov/news/health/jul2014/nci-08.htm). It is troubling to consider that obesity could be a result of younger generations having a shorter life span than that of their parents or grandparents. So what should we do about this problem?