Can’t get any fatter?
I was reading this article,
Obesity Rates Hit Plateau in U.S., Data Suggest, and was perplexed by this,
Dr. Ludwig said the plateau might just suggest that “we’ve reached a biological limit” to how obese people could get. When people eat more, he said, at first they gain weight; then a growing share of the calories go “into maintaining and moving around that excess tissue,” he continued, so that “a population doesn’t keep getting heavier and heavier indefinitely.”Furthermore, Dr. Ludwig said, “it could be that most of the people who are genetically susceptible, or susceptible for psychological or behavioral reasons, have already become obese.”
The reason I’m perplexed is that this assumes
a. that there is only a finite number of people who would gain weight no matter how much they overeat, when in fact everybody will gain weight if they overeat enough,
and that
b. the psychological or behavioral issues that provoke overeating have already arisen in the lives of those susceptible, when life’s traumas come up unexpectedly.
I would very much appreciate clarification/opinion from my readers. Do you agree with the study? What is your experience?
(click on graph for larger image)
In other, non-fatteninng items, there was no podcast this morning due to an unexpectedly heavy (pun!) workload. Instead, I’ll be in Silvio Canto’s podcast at 6PM Eastern this evening.
January 14th, 2010 at 6:07 pm
Maybe people have become more interested in fitting into their pants than stuffing their faces with cheeseburgers.
January 14th, 2010 at 6:46 pm
Kathy,
You may be on to something. Apparently people eat more when they go out to eat. With the economy down and unemployment up, people may not be going out for cheeseburgers, and may be more focused on improving their appearance to be more marketable for jobs.
January 14th, 2010 at 10:03 pm
It’s the economy – first, people are cooking more, which is generally less fattening than commercial food. Second, poorer people literally can’t afford to buy food they were eating – it’s moved back to more staples.
It shows up in the birth rate too.
January 15th, 2010 at 3:40 pm
This may be the only case where Rahm Emmanuel’s “never let a good crisis go to waste” is NOT offensive. If poverty causes one to make healthier decisions, we might as well take advantage of it.
My only question is the timeline of the study. I wonder if the data shows a significant relationship between the recession and the weight of our population.
January 15th, 2010 at 3:50 pm
Does this mean I can go off my diet and not gain weight?
January 17th, 2010 at 9:44 pm
[...] Fausta doesn’t know quite what to make of the research that obesity rates in America have leveled off. [...]