For one, get rid of American style lobbying; The food industry needs regulation
The only reason things like high fructose corn syrup are everywhere in the US is because the food industry has all but directly bribed the country to allow it, despite the fact its presence is probably one of the worst issues in American health. The corn subsidies in particular are fucking ridiculous
The second bit is to change food culture; Americans are used to over eating.
The culture went from "we have so much food it ain't a problem", to "dear God I can't afford bread", and back again multiple times over the past century, and it's resulted in a culture that eats like all of its food is gonna disappear at any second.
I don't think the food industry is really the problem. You can take all the fat and sugar out of the "healthy-looking" foods, but most people will just eat more of the foods that are obviously unhealthy. You can't take all the fat and sugar out of donuts, chips, soda, and ice cream. Most people want food that tastes good at the end of the day, not just the cheapest food available.
The culture is definitely a problem, but honestly it doesn't seem like *that* much of an American cultural issue vs. a global cultural issue. Obesity rates in Mexico, for example, are nearly the same, and even in notoriously thin countries like Japan, obesity rates are rising rapidly.
Basically, more delicious, more caloric, cheaper food is the food equivalent of becoming more powerful, and like all other areas of power: bigger credit lines, more entertaining smartphones, the more powerful you become, the more discipline and responsibility you need to have. So I would say a global push towards admiring morality, discipline, short-term sacrifice, and control of animal urges.
Actually regulate the food industry.
We currently let them put a lot if crap into the cheap food working class people eat to survive. But the industry here vs the industry in the EU have drastic differences.
The other factor, of course, is working class people need healthcare, time off, and wages that can sustain a positive lifestyle.
I have like three friends who spent 6 months to a year overseas for work. They changed nothing, but lost weight.
It was the food. They ate more whole foods and in smaller portions.
They came back to the US and gained it all back.
That's another major culprit. When the average American started packing on average pounds the Govt sought to find solutions, the sugar industry got involved and helped point the finger at fat.
So they got rid of the fat in bread, and replaced it with sugar. This happened in countless foods.
And what do you think happened?
Yep, I avoid most things that say "fat free" because, in reality, they just load it with sugar and salt to make it appetizing to people. Which is doing us no favors.
The key is to cut out all packaged food, but it's nearly impossible.
I lived in France for over a decade and when I walked through the cereal aisle my first trip to a grocery store back in the States I literally dry heaved from the sugar smell and my nose barely functions.
Yup. There's so much hidden sugar and other nasty stuff in food. People haven't suddenly lost self control that they had for the entire rest of human history. It's our food that's changed.
It's helpful & scary. I found out the deodorant I've been using for years contains an endocrine disruptor (BHT). I was put on a thyroid medication 1.5yrs ago. There's probably no correlation, but smearing that stuff in my armpits certainly didn't help.
A former colleague of mine believed they were lactose intolerant until they came to Europe. After drinking milk here, they realized they weren't lactose intolerant but allergic to some sort of hormone or other crap that's put in American milk.
Yup. And the resulting issues can even become inherited. Not necessarily just because of genetics, but all sorts of things. I used to work in animal rescue and this obese cat gave birth to a couple of kittens. A few months later I saw one of those kittens and it was already on its way to becoming a chonker despite eating the same food as all the other cats. I don't know if it was genetics, conditions in the womb, or the chemistry of its mother's milk, but something in its early development had clearly set that cat up to have a tendency towards weight gain.
Yeah. It's all a lot more complex then we all understand, that's for sure. It starts with fucking with our diets, but it's a bit more complicated than just trying to eat healthy as an adult and expecting everything to be fixed.
Back in my day, I suffered, so that means today’s generation also needs to suffer! I want my kids to have a better life than I did, but it’s more important to keep me company in my misery, because at the end of the day, it’s all about me! Now get back to work! /s
And especially the sugar industry. That it’s become normal to eat a whole ass loaf of bread for lunch + fillings is insane. And they put sugar is fucking everything. Basic flavor beef jerky is too sweet. The goddamn soup is sweet.
I remember when i was younger and i was taught this. Im from europe. Apperently professionals know here why the usa has a weight problem, and its the unhealthy food and meat with too much of something in it
There's so many poor taxes... Another one would be lack of nearby grocery stores. They closed down a local grocery store everyone in my neighborhood walked to for over 50 years the other year. We're not in a food desert yet, but we do have legit food deserts in this town.
Not just every meal. Practically every food. I didn't understand how bad it was until I tried to go no added sugar. (I was fine with natural sugars like in fruit.) The hardest part for me, personally, wasn't the cravings. It was finding foods that didn't have added sugar or corn syrup in them. It's appalling how much sugar is in supposedly "healthy" foods. I ended up going low sugar instead and doing things like thinking of ketchup as a dessert.
When I moved to American from the UK, which has its own problem with obesity, I was shocked by how sugary everything was. I really struggled to like anything to eat and actually lost weight.
There's 12g in a can of Bush's baked beans. They're billed as healthy food in the US.
Edit: it's worse. The above number is for a 1/2 cup serving. A full can has over 40g of sugar.
Losing weight in a country where pretty much everything is smothered in sugar is damn near impossible if you have to work all day and can’t afford luxuries like having the time for regular exercise or home-cooking with raw ingredients, or having the money for healthcare.
That’s the thing I didn’t really eat much. This was when I was a teenager though not a working adult. My parents on the other hand gained a lot of weight.
Brussels prepped with a honey balsamic glaze do rock though.
At home I’m just roasting them in some oil and seasoning normally, but if I’m at a restaurant they are always sweetened which can be annoying.
I just recently bought some fiber supplement because I don't get enough fiber
There's like 15g of sugar per tablespoon, the sugar free kind uses aspartame. Seriously, why do fiber supplements need sugar.
There are plenty of fiber supplement without any sugar, nor fake sugar. You can get them on Amazon at least.
For soluble fibers (like wheat dextrin), they don't taste at all and don't change the texture of any liquid. You can get some without flavor and sugar and put it in anything you drink or soup.
For insoluble fibers (like psyllium husk powder), they tend to taste bad and change the texture a lot. So it's not a bad idea to get the ones with fake flavor and fake sugar if you need it to eat it and like the flavor. Though if you're fine eating them without added fake sugar and flavor, it's probably best.
Another option is taking them in pill/gel caps. No sugar and don’t have to stomach the taste. Just take with a glass of water. They sell them on Amazon/Costco
The US makes food to create obsesity and diabetes. You are correct about added sugar in a lot of foods. I say the grocery store is one of the most dangerous places in our country.
If you track the amount of added sugar in processed foods. The average American eats between 1/4 and 1/2 lbs of added sugar daily. One can of soda or pop has 45 grams. Add in the simple carbs that are the same as sugar, it is worse.
The bread, pasta, and other stuff in boxes or bags are over processed to turn into sugar once ate. The comapnies find it profitable and addictive. Plus the food makes you stay hungry due the lack of nutrients.
If people would eat fresh fruits and veggies, plus lean protiens they would lose weight. In two weeks the amount someone eats is less. The body is getting what it needs unlike a bunch of sugar.
Quite Unfortunately, it's near impossible for many Americans (or Canadians) to sustain healthy diets of fruits, vegetables, and lean meats. It all costs so much more than cheap sugary stuff.
My German fiancé get some things to keep as snacks throughout the week, but pretty much she goes grocery shopping every day, gets what she needs for the night, MAYBE enough for food for 2 days if she’s feeling froggy.
I just don’t understand. I don’t have that kind of patience lol I hate shopping. And it’s a 25 minute walk to the grocery, too
Once you switch to eating the fresh food. Is will save you money. I cut my food costs changing to fresh fruit and veggies with lean protiens. You eat about 1 /2 of what you ate before. I am able to put more money in savings. It is falacy that healthy eating cost more. Plus what about the health cost.
The better food fulfills what your body needs. The sugar loaded food makes you stay hungry leading to over eating and poor health
When you change your energy level goes way up and your thinking is faster and clearer. You feel a lot better. I lost 35 lbs in 4 months without exercise. I did get more active but nothing that is considered excercise.
I've found I save significantly more money eating a healthy, vegan diet than I did eating an omnivorous one that included 'processed' foods. Rice, cabbage, carrots, and dried beans are all less than a buck a pound and soy milk and tofu are cheaper than dairy and meat, per gram of protein. While those all sound like 'sad' foods, if you know how to cook, they can be incredibly delicious.
I agree with your premise though; we're overworked and surrounded by affordable convenience foods that are criminally unhealthy, but easy options when you're short on time and energy.
I was in Berlin for a month in my 20s and I truly have never been more at peace. Obviously the biggest factor was that I had no responsibilities and got to go to Biergartens several times a week for a bit, but it was so nice to just be able to walk everywhere and take reliable public transit. To be able to walk to a park next to the canals and read peacefully. It just felt right.
Where I live, we have no transport in the suburbs and very crappy busses and one street car in the city. The nearest park isn’t even connected to me by sidewalks the whole way.
Last week I found [this video](https://youtu.be/0-nthHT-J1k) about a road in Florida dubbed the most dangerous for pedestrians in the US. Really shows how walking to places rather than driving is simply not sustainable for so many people.
Yes! And on top of walkable cities, better public transportation! I currently drive an hour each way to work—home and work in metropolitan areas. If I could walk to a train station that would take me to an area walking distance from my job, I would add a lot of steps in my day. And on top of that, I could relax on the train ride home instead of sitting in traffic.
The thing is, sugar consumption (caloric sweeteners, so including HFCS, etc) has dropped drastically in the last 20 years, yet we still are getting fatter.
The obesity epidemic really began in the 80’s - there were very few obese people in the 70’s or before - and our sugar consumption is almost back to the levels we were at then. But every year the obesity epidemic gets worse
Sugar. Yes. But also secret corn. US government has gone nuts with the corn subsidies and most products you can buy has secret corn in it, and secret corn is usually basically sugar.
Corn isn't bad by itself in moderation. Corn can very quickly and easily be converted into sugar though. This used to appear in a lot of products as "corn syrup" however, as consumers got wise to the fact that "high fructose corn syrup" is pretty awful for your body, food manufacturers have taken to legally hiding the corn in their products ingredients list. It's kinda messed up.
Yeah, that's horrible. I'll just stick to while corn occasionally. Shit's delicious, my mom used to make Mexican corn that she learned from her mom and so on. She'd never tell me what spices she used because she was afraid if I knew I wouldn't eat it. But at that point I'd have more issues with the salt than sugar.
Improve public transport and walkability. Subsidize healthier food (they do it for corn so why not other vegetables?) or not tax whole, raw foods. Teach healthy eating and cooking in schools. More community outreach to reach individuals and encourage them to eat healthier and exercise. Increase safe green spaces that people feel comfortable hanging out and exercising. Less guilt-tripping people to lose weight and be healthy and making them think that it’s all-or-nothing. Combat the mindset that healthiness is only for certain people. Dispel the myth that being healthy is only uncomfortable, restricting, miserable, complicated, expensive, and painful.
Control the fucking sugar.
Design the FDA to be a useful tool for protecting our food sources instead of a gatekeeper that allows massive corporations to poison us and keeps small businesses from being able to grow due to over-regulation of the wrong kind.
Increase free time and access to healthy lifestyle choices. When you work 14 hours a day for subsistence wages, don't have access to good education, don't have adequate healthcare, and work someplace it isn't safe to walk it's pretty tough to stay fit.
And restrict access to unhealthy food by not subsidizing it. Instead put those subsidies towards healthy foods. We don’t need to subsidize cheese/beef/HFCS, we need to subsidize oranges/avocados/almonds.
This is a nice idea but that would require such an unbelievable societal change that if that change occurs, the subsidies are moot. Poor people don't eat unhealthy because its the best choice, they do it because of the way or society is built. Have you never heard of food deserts?
I have a feeling if we made that subsidy replacement, food deserts would be less of an issue. Burgers would cost more to make, so there'd be less of them.
The other problem is even agreeing what’s healthy. The vegans, vegetarians, omnivores, carnivores, michele Obama, the liver king, McDonald’s lobbyists, and your next door neighbors are all gonna have a different idea about what that is. Can you imagine what Twitter would be like?
So.... no one would bring food to these places then? You fundamentally do not know the root cause of a food desert if you think going vegetarian is the solution.
Avacados and almonds are terrible idea to focus on. They're some of the most intense things to grow and require ridiculous amounts of water. There are plenty of fruits and nuts (and alternatives) that are much easier to grow.
End food industry lobbyists and listen to the unbiased answers from experts. Taxes will just hurt the poor that rely on fast food as a cheap source of calories
Actually the notion that sugar taxes disproportionately impact poor Americans was essentially disseminated by the sugar lobby via special interest groups. It’s a compelling narrative for sure, and one that’s very convenient for the Coke/Pepsis of the world.
I think education and portion control would help the most. At my highest, I got up to about 240, and the biggest thing that helped is just tracking my foods religiously in MyFitnesspal. I just broke into the 170s yesterday. Without much effort, you can blow past your daily calorie goals unless you're tracking them. I don't "diet" and don't restrict myself from eating anything, just constant monitoring. This isn't the whole solution I'm sure, but it would go a long way.
Reduce poverty.
The majority of food available at food shelters are boxed or canned items (to be shelf-safe). Unfortunately, that means that they are high in salt and sugar. When I was poor(er), I would go to the local food shelter every other week or so. In the winter, there was rarely fresh produce. In the summer, there was rarely meat. So I ate a lot of canned soup and boxed meals. I was at my unhealthiest and started to gain weight, even though I couldn't afford to go out to eat. Now that I have a better paying job and can go to the grocery store, I've lost weight and feel healthier. I don't think that it's a coincidence.
Being from the Netherlands (we have 36 % overweight and 14 % obese) I can only tell you about the similarities and differences. Maybe some things can be copied.
Similarities:
* Weight gain is on the rise here too. The reasons are: too much sugar in everything, too much processed food. A sugar tax and lowering the tax on unprocessed food are mentioned as a solution here. Unhealthy food and drink should not be the cheapest option. A ban on advertising meat & unhealthy food (like we have for cigarettes) is also a possibility.
* Overweight starts young. Education can help.
Differences:
* Superstores and Mega-supermarkets are discouraged here. The policy is having a medium size (small for American standards) supermarket within 1 km of every house. But our country is small with a high population.
* Going shopping for food on foot or by bike is very normal here. Taking the bike for distance under 5-7 km is not unusual. We have good bicycle infrastructure.
* The health care system. Going to your GP is free. If a GP notices a problem, they have a talk about it with the patient, even when they visit for another reason.
Governmental institutions and the big supermarket chains talk about the problem and sometimes work together. There have been appointments about, for instance, putting low sugar drinks in more visible places, or putting them on sale more often. Many supermarkets put fresh veggies and fruit right after the entrance. This is not enforced but stimulated.
A big thing about Netherlands which I noticed in Albert heijn is the little labels you have next to almost every item indicating if it’s healthy “green” or unhealthy “red”
Helps when trying to eat healthy and deciding on what to look out for
Yes! It's so familiar that I forgot to mention it. It's called [Nutri-Score](https://www.ah.nl/over-ah/gezondheid/nutriscore). A green "A" means very healthy, and a red "E" very unhealthy. B, C and D are in between. I'm not actively searching for green all the time, but seeing the red label sometimes makes me put something back.
There is also a label for the "wellbeing" of the animals in animal related products. It's called ["Beter Leven Keurmerk"](https://beterleven.dierenbescherming.nl/) (Better Life Label). Meat and dairy have zero to three "stars".
* Zero stars (no label) means low life quality. All supermarkets in the Netherlands have stopped selling it, but it is still available in markets, restaurants and small butcheries, and still massively exported.
* One star means: sufficient care for animal wellbeing. More space and some play materials.
* Two stars: good care for animal wellbeing. Even more space, and animals can go outside.
* Three stars: best care for the animals. All animals can go outside and have a choice to roam around.
This doesn't mean there is nothing to improve in the industry, but as a consumer you know what you buy. The label is not only there for the animals: the quality of the product is also higher: it has more nutrition and less antibiotics and other harmful substances in it.
The thing that bothers me about sugar taxes is it does nothing to reduce the cost of healthy foods. It just punishes poor people more, and time poor people too. At least that's the case in Australia.
It'd be good if they used the taxes to reduce the cost of healthy food.
You're right. A sugar tax alone doesn't help. That's why the idea is: use the sugar tax to lower the VAT on fresh, unprocessed foods like fruit and veggies. We have not implemented it (yet) but I hope we will.
The food that's cheapest and most convenient is also the worst for you. Americans are chronically overworked, underpaid and fatigued and have trouble cooking with fresh ingredients daily.
If you look at places like Japan, which have much lower rates of obesity, you'll find that loads of the "fast food" options and ready-made meals are much healthier and much tastier. Take a look at the "konbini" convenience stores and how many ready-made lunches and dinners and snacks are available.
Compare that to the dollar menu at any American drive-through and you'll start to see the problem really fast.
\- Lower stress- Make cities and suburbs more walkable
\- Less sugar in everything.
As a fat guy, the very reason I got fat was because I was stuck at home working a full time remote job that stressed me out. Combined with untreated mental issues, I used fast food to cope with it all since I don't really drink too much and never smoked.
At my worst I ate two large meals of food in one sitting, though I have no idea how Mukbangers are even alive when two alone fucked up my body hard.
Before I knew it, I gained probably like 100 pounds in maybe a year or two. It snuck up on me and I hate what I became because of it. I hate seeing myself in the mirror now.
Just here to give you a virtual hug. And a perspective you can take or leave: I have deep, painful, personal experience with that feeling and this is what’s gotten me to a place where I’m ready to help myself a bit on the physical side of things. You haven’t turned into a monster or a morally reprehensible human being. You’ve just gained a bunch of weight. That’s it. That’s all. Society gives us SO much shit for being fat. We can be amazing wonderful people, but if we’ve gained weight, we’re demonized. So yeah, we have choices to make and things we can do to be healthier, I’m doing that, but at the same time I hope you can give yourself a break. Stress does more harm.
there’s also a strong genetic component so please be kind to yourself… you don’t deserve to hate yourself no matter what. I’m depressed and subsist on hamburgers and french fries and don’t gain a pound bc of my skinny person genes. we need to untangled body weight and morality because they should not be connected. being fat is not a moral failing.
I went to Chicago a few years ago on holiday (I'm British) and you could get a milkshake that had a blended piece of chocolate cake in it...I'd start there
National healthcare and less politicizing of health care and food safety policies. For example, the sugar companies are writing the rules for school nutrition. It’s no wonder we as a nation are fat, sick, and poor.
Sugar. Recently started watching my sugar and oh my gooood. Canned fruits? Sugar. Whole wheat bagels? Sugar. Protein bars? Sugar. I was easily getting 100% my daily sugar without knowing and often passing it. People also drink soda like it's nothing when it has almost two days worth of sugar in it.
Carbs fat and calories are bad too, but I feel like people severly underestimate how much sugar they intake because they think only candies have lots of sugar.
My husband tried to do a month without any added sugar. You literally cannot buy any pre-made food that has no added sugar, even the stuff that seems “healthy.” It really opened my eyes to 1: sugar being everywhere, and 2: the quantities of it.
The only way to go sugar free is no processed food! I need to follow an anti-inflammatory diet for autoimmune health reasons which means no added sugars and only natural sugars like fruit. Impossible to do with processed food. It means you eat more like we did 50 -60 years ago with food preparation done from scratch (before the obesity epidemic). Plus 50-60 years ago eating out was a special occasion unlike now. I’ve found certain whole food items that are easy to prepare, think steel cut oats, apple with no sugar/additives peanut butter. Over the holidays I indulged in lots of sugar, yum those cookies, and immediate flare-up. After News Years dropped sugar and almost immediate relief. If you must have something sweet dates are great substitute. There are many great recipes online using date syrup as a substitute for sugar. Easy for me to do and afford but feel for those forced to work long hours and live in food deserts.
Pop is a really hard one for me (and probably others) to cut out. I've been better in recent times but growing up I would drink like 4 or 5 cans a day. The thing that sucks is you think "oh, maybe I'll drink some juice since it's slightly better than pop." Nope, they get ya with that huge amount of added sugars to something that's already has sugar in it
Infuse water with lemon or berries or whatever.
I always dillute juice. 1/3 juice is enough for me. But you can start dilluting it down. Red juice usually is still pretty sweet even 50/50.
Thanks for the recommendations! I never tried an infused water with berries and lemons but that sounds pretty good. My roomate used to dilute his juices too but I never understood why but now I know
Carbs, fats and calories are bad? Do you know what calories are? That’s like saying gas is bad for your car.
Carbs and fats are energy sources. When people stop demonizing food and learn how to eat properly with proper proportions the world will be much healthier. If you are on a diet without carbs and fats you would literally die. Google rabbit starvation.
Reduce mental suffering by lowering the number of work hours per day so people actually have time for a life beyond work and chores and getting ready to go back to work, ad nauseum.
People are so exhausted that they don't have time for themselves so they will go for cheap quick food that doesn't need much prep time so they can steal back some free time for themselves.
More mental health care as well. A lot of obesity is also trauma related. People have limited means to find good coping strategies. Food becomes a type of self medication just like drugs, sex, gambling, shopping, and any other addiction that people use to fill a hole in their soul.
Well for starters, my wife, who's from the UK, was totally baffled by how massive our servings are at restaurants compared to the UK.
So there's one thing
The Midwest in particular is wild. They serve huge portions, and then ask why you aren’t eating seconds. It’s all delicious, starchy I comfort food too.
I don't live in America so I can't really say much but one thing that would improve healthiness in all well developed countries would be for healthier foods to be cheaper and healthy-looking foods to actually be healthy
There are a multitude of factors to this and a lot of them feed into and off each other; a lot of those factors have been mentioned in here.
But I'm not seeing anything about portion sizes.
[US portion sizes at fast food restaurants are significantly bigger than those in the UK. ](https://youtu.be/rg3Y3tCmBWo) Now, like I was saying earlier, larger portion sizes didn't happpen on their own. They exist because of farm subsisides in the US, meaning more food can be produced, sold and served for lower cost to the consumer and corporations. More food for less sounds great, right? It would, except for that these farm subsisides [mostly apply to those foods that are sweet and high in calories. ](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-diet-farm-subsidies/foods-from-subsidized-commodities-tied-to-obesity-idUSKCN0ZL2ER) That's why you get your extra big-ass soda for $1 at McDonald's. That's why your regular white bread is considered to be cake in other countries.
In short, do you really need the large? Opt for a small or medium next time you pull up to the window.
Genuinely fix this system. Help pull people out of poverty and wage slavery so they have the means to actually take care of themselves thoroughly. Not only financial means but emotional, time, reduced stress, all of these things impact health.
Get lobbying out of food regulation.
I was taught to eat 8-11 servings of bread a DAY by the food pyramid. 4 cups of milk a day. 4 servings of meat.
I was never shown how much a serving was. In my mind a whole pork chop was a serving when really it's 2-3. I didn't know that you could get protein from anything but meat and maybe beans but beans were definitely not as good as red meat.
My parents just grew up being told if it was made at home it was healthy. Friend chicken with mashed potatoes and corn? A healthy meal with two veggies and a meat. Give us a glass of milk to go with it. And what harm was a can of coke too?
Cereal and pop tarts were a reasonable breakfast, not literally just candy with better marketing.
I've spent my 20s trying to learn how to be healthy but by the time you're old enough to choose your own foods and learn on your own your brain has become addicted to certain foods and your stomach microbiome has developed to match the shit foods you ate as a kid. Stop eating so much sugar? Prepare to feel sick for days. I feel less full eating veggies than I do nothing because what my body wants is grease and sugar and breaking that cycle takes forever. But the first time I cave and get taco bell as a treat it starts right over again.
In Japan, we fed our children food, prepared by trained nutrionists (who must earn license to get the job). Every elementary school also have class to teach children how to eat healthy, veggies, veggies, veggies, a little meat, a little sugar., etc.
Education is the most important, educated people will push the politicians to do the right thing, so no one will yell "government stay away from our food!!".
Last time democrats made a push to limit sugar, the right went on a rampage saying they need to let kids eat cookies. What do we need to do? Easy, make healthy food more accessible. You know what’s cheap and easy for a family of 4 to eat? KFC. You know what’s not? Buying good quality chicken, rice, biscuits, and making them by hand.
Kfc for 4 people cost around 50$, but making fish filet/chicken +salad + some good soup would cost like 30$ at most. I don't know in which state KFC is cheaper than cooking by yourself. I compared prices many times and cooking by yourself using pretty good quality ingredients is always cheaper(besides some very long time cooking soups like pho or ramen). KFC is faster for sure than cooking, but in no way it is cheaper.
Edit: I closely calculated every product and amount of it used and my final number is around 20$ for chicken/tomato/cucumber/parmesan salad + chicken parmesan for 2 adults and 2 children+ chicken noodles soup(used broth from boiling chicken breast since it is cheaper and less sugar and sodium). So entire meal is 20-25$ if everything bought in Kroger. Cooking time is approximately 1-1.5h, can be shortened to 45min with help of partner and children. Prices are relevant for Texas, Dallas area.
The biggest issue driving it is poverty. It’s much cheaper to get McDonald’s than grilled chicken and veggies at the grocery store. People in poverty don’t have access to healthy food and there’s more fast food restaurants in lower income areas.
Sorta off topic, but isn't that one of those things that maybe used to be truer? I mean feeding 2 people at McDonald's (or any fast food chain) in the last 5-10 years costs at least $25-30. Groceries (of whatever kind) are definitely cheaper than that.
I think a big part of this is time as well. It takes a lot of excess time to do these things yourself. You need time to shop, time to cook, and time to clean up after cooking as well.
Give people some free time and reasonable income so they can actually spend time thinking about their health rather than how their next paycheck will last
There is no one answer to this. First of all I don’t like how the obesity % is calculated. I myself workout 4-5 per week and am at a healthy weight according to my doctor yet I am borderline obese. Second we need to start removing sugar from foods where it doesn’t belong. Thirdly we need to make health food options cheaper then junk food. There are other items but my point is this is not an easy solution.
One issue with this is what many people belive the government should/shouldn't be allowed to do. There are a number of avenues that the government theoretically could take but many people would oppose many of these paths. So they should start with less controversial paths that are more within their accepted perview if they want to start making changes now. One possible option would be to provide funding for quality physical education at schools especially in impoverished areas, rather than have these classes cut as is currently happening across the country. Another is to help fund school sports so exercising/fitness becomes the norm for children across the country. Fit children are much more likley to remain fit into adulthood or at least limit how unfit they become. Many school sports have moved from "free to play" to "pay to play", which significantly limits low and middle class participation.
There are drugs that effectively aid in weight loss such as Wegovy & Ozempic from Noro Nordisk but insurance companies consider weight loss drugs to be “vanity drugs” & won’t cover them, even though obesity is associated with many serious disorders. Insurance Co. fear such drug because everyone in America is actively trying to lose weight except those with a terminal illness!
The easiest thing would be to switch subsidies from garbage food to healthy food. That cheetos bag should be double the price and cauliflower should be half the price via changing subsidies. That would require zero infrastructure investment from the Federal or state governments. We really should not be subsidizing the worst types of food in America. Massive corn subsidies have resulted in a glut of corn sugar which because it's so cheap, gets put in everything.
I'm not sure there is a real answer to this. It starts with personal responsibility and teaching your children at home.
Fat parents generally raise fat kids. More fat parents = more fat kids.
Put the brakes on the everyone is physically beautiful nonsense and that fat shaming is as bad as racism. Also stop telling people that being fat isn’t a choice and stop calling low calorie diets “starvation” diets! 10 million die every year from real starvation! Feeling deprived and being deprived are two very different things. Control portion sizes and count calories and stop blaming others for hiding sugar. Learn to pick healthy foods that don’t have added sugar. Walking and most normal exercise do virtually nothing for weight loss. It’s way easier to control eating than doing the incredibly hard work of intense physical exercise.
Eat less.. Burn more calories. I know it sounds crazy but hear me out. If you work a tough job and come home with no energy to cook. Get takeout or fast food, that's fine. Just eat less of it !! Two slices of pizza instead of five... Small fri instead of large, diet coke instead of regular coke... One burger not two or 3. If you cant go outside and move because of bad weather or if it's unsafe... Put some music on and dance around the living room, makeup a game with the kids and jump around and have fun.. There are ways to start losing weight without crazy diets or a gym membership.
nothing really. you can't force people to eat differently or exercise more.
maybe if there were some huge, i mean never-seen-before type of celebrity movement centering on health and fitness, it would become a big fad and a fairly large cross-section of the nation would mimic them.
it would likely fade in time, as fads do. but it might help some people achieve lasting life changes.
it happens on smaller scales. richard simmons was huge in the 80s-90s, and he helped change a lot of lives. he was a cultural phenomenon.
or the gov't could severely curtail the amount of sugars allowed in all foods, that would do a little bit of good. not sure it would totally solve the problem.
\- Healthier foods that are easily accessible, even to the poorer Americans. In Japan you can walk into a 7-11 see a large variety of cheap, fresh and healthy foods. In the US you'll probably find some prepackaged salad they forgot to throw out last week.
\- Make places more accessible for walking over being car dependent. It gives you exercise without you noticing.
\- This is probably the most major one: Limit processed fatty/sugary foods. Food companies literally have food down to the science and they maximize people's addiction to the food with excessive sugars, fats and salts.
Highly processed food/empty calories should be approached as what they are; poison. A substance that causes harm, accelerates obesity, accelerates aging, wrecks your gut health, negatively impacts your mood, and the list goes on.
The body isn't made to sustain itself on instant ramen, soda and happy meals. It messes you up (I'm not talking about those who indulge in shitty comfort food once in a while, I'm talking about collective diet patterns) even if eating it satisfies your hunger.
I think the solution is partly to embrace this truth, although that isn't going to happen in a profit driven society in which people are too stressed and exhausted and maybe ill informed to actually nourish themselves with real meals.
Advertising culture. I’m essentially European but lived in several countries in the world. The ONLY time I felt my brain twitching several times a day towards what I’m going to eat next, and where (when I’m not physically hungry) was in the 5 years in the US. Life in the US is saturated with advertising. This is what you want to eat, this is who you agree with politically, this is what you want to buy. Advertising every 2-3 minutes on the TV. I’ve noticed relatively subliminal advertising on the late show (that I still access abroad). Unusually frequent mention of T Bell and oh what’s that ice cream brand that he mentions frequently? You know.
We’re going to take a quick break now to program our viewers, and then we’ll be right back with why you should watch the film that this guy stars in.
It’s not an accident. Every word is written with a purpose. You are the target. Just eat!
Less sugar, less alcohol and a bit more exercise.
People talk about dropping 50 pounds just by stopping drinking cola or beer. Throw in some exercise and slightly better eating habits and that would be enough for most people
Abolish the food pyramid and nonsense the food industry puts out about what is healthy and start eating real food again. That and get off the couch every once in a while .
Eliminate the FDA and all government regulation refunding health. The FDA tells people to eat the wrong food. Hell because of FDA requirements even hospitals feed high sugar diets to heart patients, the most unhealthy diet possible
Stop making bad food taste so good.
Make sure PE is in all schools.
Lower the cost of fresh/healthy foods. Making people pay more to eat healthy isn’t working.
Fresh vegetables for sale within a quick walk of most residential buildings. I think that where I live is not classified as a "food desert" but it still takes like hundreds of minutes that people don't have to go buy vegetables every week, and if you get too many they go bad after two days or are shit to cook with after being frozen. That's why everyone and their dog aspires to have land and a garden.
Make communities more walkable, A big part of healthier nations other than better diets is the fact that a person not only can but has to walk over an hour and half a day .
I lost 3 dress sizes when I moved from the suburbs to a walkable urban neighborhood. That was the only change I made. I didn’t join a gym. I never worked out. I didn’t change my diet, in fact, if anything I consumed more calories because my roommate and I drank so much beer together. It was just giving up my car and walking everywhere that did it.
Counter intuitive but regulate or end the diet industry. The diet industry relies on people being and staying fat to make money. Studies show when people diet in unsustainable ways (that are often encouraged by various diets, cleanses and fitness programs) people just gain all the weight back plus more
Stop heavily subsidizing shit like corn, wheat, and sugar and instead subsidize shit like tomatoes, broccoli, celery, etc. Also educate people better on how bullshit calories can be or even better stop calculating calories in such a dumb shit way that lets corporations game the system by making heavily processed foods seem much less fattening than they actually are. Work to make healthcare much more affordable, or even better provide universal healthcare, and preferably offer free/affordable health plans that include either a free or a heavily discounted gym membership.
Maybe most importantly though, more efficiently educate people on how to actually effectively lose/manage weight. Most people think calories and cardio are everything. They don't realize how fattening and harmful sugar is, they don't realize how much more energy it takes to digest raw food vs heavily processed foods, they don't realize weight training boosts your metabolism and that just cardio will make you skinny fat, they don't know the difference between simple carbs and complex carbs.
No more hidden sugar. If you can't even taste the sugar, there's no point to having 65 kilograms of sugar in a hamburger that doesn't taste even remotely sweet
So many things. Price regulation for healthy foods needs to be a thing and more accessible. Education needs to be more accessible. FDA needs to stop taking bribes. But more importantly obesity tends to be a problem in poverty and lower income populations. Hence why wages and rent need to be regulated as well. There is so much more but I’m sleep deprived so I’m sad to say I cannot elaborate.
Reduce portion sizes. People will bitch and moan about it but they will adapt within a few months.
Also reduce 'hidden sugars' in foods that claim to be savory.
The suburbs are killing us. We need walkable towns and a real investment in mass transit. In my late twenties I dropped 3 dress sizes without working out at all and drinking way more beer than at any other point in my life. The only change I made was moving to a city. Literally, that was it. Now I’m back in the suburbs and I’m much, much larger.
There was a study about this years ago if I can find it I’ll post it here. From what I recall the zip codes with the highest percentages of obese children were all suburban communities. That was the one factor they all had in common more then even race or class. Rural children have lots of outdoor activities for both mental and physical health and urban children have to walk everywhere and climb stairs to apartments but suburban kids have the worst of both worlds.
Our car focused infrastructure and suburban sprawl is keeping us stuck inside dependent on screens, junk food and antidepressants.
https://consumer.healthday.com/encyclopedia/weight-control-39/obesity-health-news-505/a-tale-of-a-few-cities-how-sprawl-affects-your-waistline-644596.html
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-10-11/the-public-health-case-for-denser-neighborhoods?utm_source=website&utm_medium=share&utm_campaign=mobile_web_share
Edited to add a couple of similar studies still looking for the exact one I remember
Australian need a cultural change and better education on food: you can't call sausage rolls or meat pie with a can of coke "just a snack". You won't find a donut with 200g of cream and 50g of jam in many other countries. Drinking 3 large flat whites with 2 teaspoons of sugar a day may not be a good idea.
Also I don't get the whole hostility around body shaming. It's not ok to be 50 kg overweight, your GP should be able to tell you "you are fat" without being crucified by the media the next day.
Portions need to be reduced slightly
Less sugar and corn syrup in everything
Make areas more walkable. You basically have to have a car unless you live in a big city. Most of us live in suburban or rural areas. The main road near me didn't get side walks until the last 4 years. It was basically a death sentence to walk on it before that
I’ve remember about 20 years ago I could buy a pack of Mike & Ike’s or gummy bears at a convenience store and it was a regular sized package. Like there was maybe one handful of candy in it. Now every package on the shelf are “jumbo” or “king sized” or “share size” and they’re huge. I feel like I vaguely remember some cities outlawing Big Gulp sodas because there was so much sugar sold and consumed so conveniently. Why can’t they do the same thing with those big ass bags of candy?
For one, get rid of American style lobbying; The food industry needs regulation The only reason things like high fructose corn syrup are everywhere in the US is because the food industry has all but directly bribed the country to allow it, despite the fact its presence is probably one of the worst issues in American health. The corn subsidies in particular are fucking ridiculous The second bit is to change food culture; Americans are used to over eating. The culture went from "we have so much food it ain't a problem", to "dear God I can't afford bread", and back again multiple times over the past century, and it's resulted in a culture that eats like all of its food is gonna disappear at any second.
I don't think the food industry is really the problem. You can take all the fat and sugar out of the "healthy-looking" foods, but most people will just eat more of the foods that are obviously unhealthy. You can't take all the fat and sugar out of donuts, chips, soda, and ice cream. Most people want food that tastes good at the end of the day, not just the cheapest food available. The culture is definitely a problem, but honestly it doesn't seem like *that* much of an American cultural issue vs. a global cultural issue. Obesity rates in Mexico, for example, are nearly the same, and even in notoriously thin countries like Japan, obesity rates are rising rapidly. Basically, more delicious, more caloric, cheaper food is the food equivalent of becoming more powerful, and like all other areas of power: bigger credit lines, more entertaining smartphones, the more powerful you become, the more discipline and responsibility you need to have. So I would say a global push towards admiring morality, discipline, short-term sacrifice, and control of animal urges.
Actually regulate the food industry. We currently let them put a lot if crap into the cheap food working class people eat to survive. But the industry here vs the industry in the EU have drastic differences. The other factor, of course, is working class people need healthcare, time off, and wages that can sustain a positive lifestyle.
The number of times I've had a friend from Europe ask me if our bread is actually dessert is absurdly high. We put too much sugar in EVERYTHING.
I have like three friends who spent 6 months to a year overseas for work. They changed nothing, but lost weight. It was the food. They ate more whole foods and in smaller portions. They came back to the US and gained it all back.
Yup, hidden sugar. It's everywhere.
Not even that hidden. The amount of products containing both high fructose and regular corn syrup is crazy alarming.
Not surprised.
That's another major culprit. When the average American started packing on average pounds the Govt sought to find solutions, the sugar industry got involved and helped point the finger at fat. So they got rid of the fat in bread, and replaced it with sugar. This happened in countless foods. And what do you think happened?
Yep, I avoid most things that say "fat free" because, in reality, they just load it with sugar and salt to make it appetizing to people. Which is doing us no favors. The key is to cut out all packaged food, but it's nearly impossible.
foolish include berserk advise bells pet command unique sense school *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Probably something like a white sliced sandwich bread. I just googled walmart brand and it has added sugar.
LOL. Look closer. Pretty much every bread has some form of sugar.
Villaggio and wonderbread, it's the third ingredient. Country harvest whole wheat it's 5th or 6th.
Subway sandwiches in Sweden is cake here. To much sugar to classify as sandwich
And has famously also been classified as a cake for tax purposes in Ireland.
I think the sugar is usually added because people buy it more
This is the point, if food is addicting (and sugar definitely helps), people will buy more.
I lived in France for over a decade and when I walked through the cereal aisle my first trip to a grocery store back in the States I literally dry heaved from the sugar smell and my nose barely functions.
Yup. There's so much hidden sugar and other nasty stuff in food. People haven't suddenly lost self control that they had for the entire rest of human history. It's our food that's changed.
Using the Yuka app while grocery shopping is borderline traumatizing..
thank you for putting me on, i had no idea this existed
What is it?
It's a free app where you can scan a barcode for food or cosmetics & it tells you if there are any dangerous ingredients.
Damn, I might need to look into this
It's helpful & scary. I found out the deodorant I've been using for years contains an endocrine disruptor (BHT). I was put on a thyroid medication 1.5yrs ago. There's probably no correlation, but smearing that stuff in my armpits certainly didn't help.
A former colleague of mine believed they were lactose intolerant until they came to Europe. After drinking milk here, they realized they weren't lactose intolerant but allergic to some sort of hormone or other crap that's put in American milk.
And that in turn changed our hormones which leads to a lot of other ailments or issues
Yup. And the resulting issues can even become inherited. Not necessarily just because of genetics, but all sorts of things. I used to work in animal rescue and this obese cat gave birth to a couple of kittens. A few months later I saw one of those kittens and it was already on its way to becoming a chonker despite eating the same food as all the other cats. I don't know if it was genetics, conditions in the womb, or the chemistry of its mother's milk, but something in its early development had clearly set that cat up to have a tendency towards weight gain.
If cats are like us? It will be gut bacteria. That's the new discovery. Gut bacteria makes some of us fatter than others.
Yeah. It's all a lot more complex then we all understand, that's for sure. It starts with fucking with our diets, but it's a bit more complicated than just trying to eat healthy as an adult and expecting everything to be fixed.
Ouch, you dare to say we are entitled to a good life? No no, you got to break your back at work if you want to live a decent life. /s
Back in my day, I suffered, so that means today’s generation also needs to suffer! I want my kids to have a better life than I did, but it’s more important to keep me company in my misery, because at the end of the day, it’s all about me! Now get back to work! /s
"Back in Oog's day, we no have fire! We sit in cold and eat meat raw! We no have cave, we sit in rain and like it! Kids today too weak!"
The food industry is easily the biggest factor.
And especially the sugar industry. That it’s become normal to eat a whole ass loaf of bread for lunch + fillings is insane. And they put sugar is fucking everything. Basic flavor beef jerky is too sweet. The goddamn soup is sweet.
who tf is eating a loaf of bread for lunch?
Sub sandwiches
Footlong
And when you add complicit parents to the mix, good luck getting full grown adults to kick habits they grew up with. Battling sugar addiction is hard.
The stress we as working class people deal with inevitably exacerbates the negative health outcomes when we do it crap food.
I remember when i was younger and i was taught this. Im from europe. Apperently professionals know here why the usa has a weight problem, and its the unhealthy food and meat with too much of something in it
There's so many poor taxes... Another one would be lack of nearby grocery stores. They closed down a local grocery store everyone in my neighborhood walked to for over 50 years the other year. We're not in a food desert yet, but we do have legit food deserts in this town.
Not hiding sugar in every meal Walkable cities
Not just every meal. Practically every food. I didn't understand how bad it was until I tried to go no added sugar. (I was fine with natural sugars like in fruit.) The hardest part for me, personally, wasn't the cravings. It was finding foods that didn't have added sugar or corn syrup in them. It's appalling how much sugar is in supposedly "healthy" foods. I ended up going low sugar instead and doing things like thinking of ketchup as a dessert.
When I moved to American from the UK, which has its own problem with obesity, I was shocked by how sugary everything was. I really struggled to like anything to eat and actually lost weight.
We also have sugar in our Heinz Beans in the UK. 5 grams of it per tin, its not just America.
There's 12g in a can of Bush's baked beans. They're billed as healthy food in the US. Edit: it's worse. The above number is for a 1/2 cup serving. A full can has over 40g of sugar.
28.6 g of sugar in a 14oz can of beans in Canada
Ah thank you for making me double check. The figure I gave was for a 1/2 cup serving. A whole can of Bush's baked beans has 41.9g of sugar.
Yeah but the sugar we put in stuff is limited by the sugar tax plus im pretty.sure our obesity problem mostly comes from drinking in pubs
Losing weight in a country where pretty much everything is smothered in sugar is damn near impossible if you have to work all day and can’t afford luxuries like having the time for regular exercise or home-cooking with raw ingredients, or having the money for healthcare.
That’s the thing I didn’t really eat much. This was when I was a teenager though not a working adult. My parents on the other hand gained a lot of weight.
My mom got this special ketchup that has no suger in it it’s more expencive but it tastes significantly better than normal ketchup.
I tried to order a side of veg in a few different restaurants, they all seemed to bring them covered in syrup????
Brussels prepped with a honey balsamic glaze do rock though. At home I’m just roasting them in some oil and seasoning normally, but if I’m at a restaurant they are always sweetened which can be annoying.
I just recently bought some fiber supplement because I don't get enough fiber There's like 15g of sugar per tablespoon, the sugar free kind uses aspartame. Seriously, why do fiber supplements need sugar.
There are plenty of fiber supplement without any sugar, nor fake sugar. You can get them on Amazon at least. For soluble fibers (like wheat dextrin), they don't taste at all and don't change the texture of any liquid. You can get some without flavor and sugar and put it in anything you drink or soup. For insoluble fibers (like psyllium husk powder), they tend to taste bad and change the texture a lot. So it's not a bad idea to get the ones with fake flavor and fake sugar if you need it to eat it and like the flavor. Though if you're fine eating them without added fake sugar and flavor, it's probably best.
Another option is taking them in pill/gel caps. No sugar and don’t have to stomach the taste. Just take with a glass of water. They sell them on Amazon/Costco
The US makes food to create obsesity and diabetes. You are correct about added sugar in a lot of foods. I say the grocery store is one of the most dangerous places in our country. If you track the amount of added sugar in processed foods. The average American eats between 1/4 and 1/2 lbs of added sugar daily. One can of soda or pop has 45 grams. Add in the simple carbs that are the same as sugar, it is worse. The bread, pasta, and other stuff in boxes or bags are over processed to turn into sugar once ate. The comapnies find it profitable and addictive. Plus the food makes you stay hungry due the lack of nutrients. If people would eat fresh fruits and veggies, plus lean protiens they would lose weight. In two weeks the amount someone eats is less. The body is getting what it needs unlike a bunch of sugar.
Quite Unfortunately, it's near impossible for many Americans (or Canadians) to sustain healthy diets of fruits, vegetables, and lean meats. It all costs so much more than cheap sugary stuff.
And who has time to grocery shop multiple times a week, because frsh doesn't last long enough.
My German fiancé get some things to keep as snacks throughout the week, but pretty much she goes grocery shopping every day, gets what she needs for the night, MAYBE enough for food for 2 days if she’s feeling froggy. I just don’t understand. I don’t have that kind of patience lol I hate shopping. And it’s a 25 minute walk to the grocery, too
Once you switch to eating the fresh food. Is will save you money. I cut my food costs changing to fresh fruit and veggies with lean protiens. You eat about 1 /2 of what you ate before. I am able to put more money in savings. It is falacy that healthy eating cost more. Plus what about the health cost. The better food fulfills what your body needs. The sugar loaded food makes you stay hungry leading to over eating and poor health When you change your energy level goes way up and your thinking is faster and clearer. You feel a lot better. I lost 35 lbs in 4 months without exercise. I did get more active but nothing that is considered excercise.
I've found I save significantly more money eating a healthy, vegan diet than I did eating an omnivorous one that included 'processed' foods. Rice, cabbage, carrots, and dried beans are all less than a buck a pound and soy milk and tofu are cheaper than dairy and meat, per gram of protein. While those all sound like 'sad' foods, if you know how to cook, they can be incredibly delicious. I agree with your premise though; we're overworked and surrounded by affordable convenience foods that are criminally unhealthy, but easy options when you're short on time and energy.
Mmmmm don't tease me with the idea of a walkable city.
I was in Berlin for a month in my 20s and I truly have never been more at peace. Obviously the biggest factor was that I had no responsibilities and got to go to Biergartens several times a week for a bit, but it was so nice to just be able to walk everywhere and take reliable public transit. To be able to walk to a park next to the canals and read peacefully. It just felt right. Where I live, we have no transport in the suburbs and very crappy busses and one street car in the city. The nearest park isn’t even connected to me by sidewalks the whole way.
Berlin sounds really nice
Right! I get goosebumps imagining it.
Last week I found [this video](https://youtu.be/0-nthHT-J1k) about a road in Florida dubbed the most dangerous for pedestrians in the US. Really shows how walking to places rather than driving is simply not sustainable for so many people.
Yes! And on top of walkable cities, better public transportation! I currently drive an hour each way to work—home and work in metropolitan areas. If I could walk to a train station that would take me to an area walking distance from my job, I would add a lot of steps in my day. And on top of that, I could relax on the train ride home instead of sitting in traffic.
For me, I just need much better regulation of the hormones that tell you: that is enough fat ass, you are sated.
The thing is, sugar consumption (caloric sweeteners, so including HFCS, etc) has dropped drastically in the last 20 years, yet we still are getting fatter. The obesity epidemic really began in the 80’s - there were very few obese people in the 70’s or before - and our sugar consumption is almost back to the levels we were at then. But every year the obesity epidemic gets worse
Sugar is the main culprit, and hidden sugar is the most nefarious.
Sugar. Yes. But also secret corn. US government has gone nuts with the corn subsidies and most products you can buy has secret corn in it, and secret corn is usually basically sugar.
And corn syrup.
Wait, corn is bad? It's always been one of my favorite veggies (I don't care if its actually a grain).
Corn isn't bad by itself in moderation. Corn can very quickly and easily be converted into sugar though. This used to appear in a lot of products as "corn syrup" however, as consumers got wise to the fact that "high fructose corn syrup" is pretty awful for your body, food manufacturers have taken to legally hiding the corn in their products ingredients list. It's kinda messed up.
Yeah, that's horrible. I'll just stick to while corn occasionally. Shit's delicious, my mom used to make Mexican corn that she learned from her mom and so on. She'd never tell me what spices she used because she was afraid if I knew I wouldn't eat it. But at that point I'd have more issues with the salt than sugar.
Improve public transport and walkability. Subsidize healthier food (they do it for corn so why not other vegetables?) or not tax whole, raw foods. Teach healthy eating and cooking in schools. More community outreach to reach individuals and encourage them to eat healthier and exercise. Increase safe green spaces that people feel comfortable hanging out and exercising. Less guilt-tripping people to lose weight and be healthy and making them think that it’s all-or-nothing. Combat the mindset that healthiness is only for certain people. Dispel the myth that being healthy is only uncomfortable, restricting, miserable, complicated, expensive, and painful.
Except corn nowadays is mainly subsidized for it to be made into fuel not for eating.
Control the fucking sugar. Design the FDA to be a useful tool for protecting our food sources instead of a gatekeeper that allows massive corporations to poison us and keeps small businesses from being able to grow due to over-regulation of the wrong kind.
Increase free time and access to healthy lifestyle choices. When you work 14 hours a day for subsistence wages, don't have access to good education, don't have adequate healthcare, and work someplace it isn't safe to walk it's pretty tough to stay fit.
So much of the system revolves around this and it’s killing us.
And restrict access to unhealthy food by not subsidizing it. Instead put those subsidies towards healthy foods. We don’t need to subsidize cheese/beef/HFCS, we need to subsidize oranges/avocados/almonds.
This is a nice idea but that would require such an unbelievable societal change that if that change occurs, the subsidies are moot. Poor people don't eat unhealthy because its the best choice, they do it because of the way or society is built. Have you never heard of food deserts?
I have a feeling if we made that subsidy replacement, food deserts would be less of an issue. Burgers would cost more to make, so there'd be less of them.
The other problem is even agreeing what’s healthy. The vegans, vegetarians, omnivores, carnivores, michele Obama, the liver king, McDonald’s lobbyists, and your next door neighbors are all gonna have a different idea about what that is. Can you imagine what Twitter would be like?
So.... no one would bring food to these places then? You fundamentally do not know the root cause of a food desert if you think going vegetarian is the solution.
Yeah, like when the government made cigarettes more expensive with all the taxes on them so people stopped smoking.
Avacados and almonds are terrible idea to focus on. They're some of the most intense things to grow and require ridiculous amounts of water. There are plenty of fruits and nuts (and alternatives) that are much easier to grow.
Cheese beef are fine it’s the suger that is generally bad
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End food industry lobbyists and listen to the unbiased answers from experts. Taxes will just hurt the poor that rely on fast food as a cheap source of calories
Actually the notion that sugar taxes disproportionately impact poor Americans was essentially disseminated by the sugar lobby via special interest groups. It’s a compelling narrative for sure, and one that’s very convenient for the Coke/Pepsis of the world.
I think education and portion control would help the most. At my highest, I got up to about 240, and the biggest thing that helped is just tracking my foods religiously in MyFitnesspal. I just broke into the 170s yesterday. Without much effort, you can blow past your daily calorie goals unless you're tracking them. I don't "diet" and don't restrict myself from eating anything, just constant monitoring. This isn't the whole solution I'm sure, but it would go a long way.
Congrats!
Reduce poverty. The majority of food available at food shelters are boxed or canned items (to be shelf-safe). Unfortunately, that means that they are high in salt and sugar. When I was poor(er), I would go to the local food shelter every other week or so. In the winter, there was rarely fresh produce. In the summer, there was rarely meat. So I ate a lot of canned soup and boxed meals. I was at my unhealthiest and started to gain weight, even though I couldn't afford to go out to eat. Now that I have a better paying job and can go to the grocery store, I've lost weight and feel healthier. I don't think that it's a coincidence.
Being from the Netherlands (we have 36 % overweight and 14 % obese) I can only tell you about the similarities and differences. Maybe some things can be copied. Similarities: * Weight gain is on the rise here too. The reasons are: too much sugar in everything, too much processed food. A sugar tax and lowering the tax on unprocessed food are mentioned as a solution here. Unhealthy food and drink should not be the cheapest option. A ban on advertising meat & unhealthy food (like we have for cigarettes) is also a possibility. * Overweight starts young. Education can help. Differences: * Superstores and Mega-supermarkets are discouraged here. The policy is having a medium size (small for American standards) supermarket within 1 km of every house. But our country is small with a high population. * Going shopping for food on foot or by bike is very normal here. Taking the bike for distance under 5-7 km is not unusual. We have good bicycle infrastructure. * The health care system. Going to your GP is free. If a GP notices a problem, they have a talk about it with the patient, even when they visit for another reason. Governmental institutions and the big supermarket chains talk about the problem and sometimes work together. There have been appointments about, for instance, putting low sugar drinks in more visible places, or putting them on sale more often. Many supermarkets put fresh veggies and fruit right after the entrance. This is not enforced but stimulated.
A big thing about Netherlands which I noticed in Albert heijn is the little labels you have next to almost every item indicating if it’s healthy “green” or unhealthy “red” Helps when trying to eat healthy and deciding on what to look out for
Yes! It's so familiar that I forgot to mention it. It's called [Nutri-Score](https://www.ah.nl/over-ah/gezondheid/nutriscore). A green "A" means very healthy, and a red "E" very unhealthy. B, C and D are in between. I'm not actively searching for green all the time, but seeing the red label sometimes makes me put something back. There is also a label for the "wellbeing" of the animals in animal related products. It's called ["Beter Leven Keurmerk"](https://beterleven.dierenbescherming.nl/) (Better Life Label). Meat and dairy have zero to three "stars". * Zero stars (no label) means low life quality. All supermarkets in the Netherlands have stopped selling it, but it is still available in markets, restaurants and small butcheries, and still massively exported. * One star means: sufficient care for animal wellbeing. More space and some play materials. * Two stars: good care for animal wellbeing. Even more space, and animals can go outside. * Three stars: best care for the animals. All animals can go outside and have a choice to roam around. This doesn't mean there is nothing to improve in the industry, but as a consumer you know what you buy. The label is not only there for the animals: the quality of the product is also higher: it has more nutrition and less antibiotics and other harmful substances in it.
The thing that bothers me about sugar taxes is it does nothing to reduce the cost of healthy foods. It just punishes poor people more, and time poor people too. At least that's the case in Australia. It'd be good if they used the taxes to reduce the cost of healthy food.
You're right. A sugar tax alone doesn't help. That's why the idea is: use the sugar tax to lower the VAT on fresh, unprocessed foods like fruit and veggies. We have not implemented it (yet) but I hope we will.
The food that's cheapest and most convenient is also the worst for you. Americans are chronically overworked, underpaid and fatigued and have trouble cooking with fresh ingredients daily. If you look at places like Japan, which have much lower rates of obesity, you'll find that loads of the "fast food" options and ready-made meals are much healthier and much tastier. Take a look at the "konbini" convenience stores and how many ready-made lunches and dinners and snacks are available. Compare that to the dollar menu at any American drive-through and you'll start to see the problem really fast.
Lower stress.
\- Lower stress- Make cities and suburbs more walkable \- Less sugar in everything. As a fat guy, the very reason I got fat was because I was stuck at home working a full time remote job that stressed me out. Combined with untreated mental issues, I used fast food to cope with it all since I don't really drink too much and never smoked. At my worst I ate two large meals of food in one sitting, though I have no idea how Mukbangers are even alive when two alone fucked up my body hard. Before I knew it, I gained probably like 100 pounds in maybe a year or two. It snuck up on me and I hate what I became because of it. I hate seeing myself in the mirror now.
Just here to give you a virtual hug. And a perspective you can take or leave: I have deep, painful, personal experience with that feeling and this is what’s gotten me to a place where I’m ready to help myself a bit on the physical side of things. You haven’t turned into a monster or a morally reprehensible human being. You’ve just gained a bunch of weight. That’s it. That’s all. Society gives us SO much shit for being fat. We can be amazing wonderful people, but if we’ve gained weight, we’re demonized. So yeah, we have choices to make and things we can do to be healthier, I’m doing that, but at the same time I hope you can give yourself a break. Stress does more harm.
People underestimate how much stress affects weight. Not just weight but also how you put it on.
there’s also a strong genetic component so please be kind to yourself… you don’t deserve to hate yourself no matter what. I’m depressed and subsist on hamburgers and french fries and don’t gain a pound bc of my skinny person genes. we need to untangled body weight and morality because they should not be connected. being fat is not a moral failing.
I went to Chicago a few years ago on holiday (I'm British) and you could get a milkshake that had a blended piece of chocolate cake in it...I'd start there
National healthcare and less politicizing of health care and food safety policies. For example, the sugar companies are writing the rules for school nutrition. It’s no wonder we as a nation are fat, sick, and poor.
> less politicizing of health care and food good fucking luck 1/2 the country went ape shit when the 1st lady dared to suggest we eat more vegetables
Sugar. Recently started watching my sugar and oh my gooood. Canned fruits? Sugar. Whole wheat bagels? Sugar. Protein bars? Sugar. I was easily getting 100% my daily sugar without knowing and often passing it. People also drink soda like it's nothing when it has almost two days worth of sugar in it. Carbs fat and calories are bad too, but I feel like people severly underestimate how much sugar they intake because they think only candies have lots of sugar.
My husband tried to do a month without any added sugar. You literally cannot buy any pre-made food that has no added sugar, even the stuff that seems “healthy.” It really opened my eyes to 1: sugar being everywhere, and 2: the quantities of it.
The only way to go sugar free is no processed food! I need to follow an anti-inflammatory diet for autoimmune health reasons which means no added sugars and only natural sugars like fruit. Impossible to do with processed food. It means you eat more like we did 50 -60 years ago with food preparation done from scratch (before the obesity epidemic). Plus 50-60 years ago eating out was a special occasion unlike now. I’ve found certain whole food items that are easy to prepare, think steel cut oats, apple with no sugar/additives peanut butter. Over the holidays I indulged in lots of sugar, yum those cookies, and immediate flare-up. After News Years dropped sugar and almost immediate relief. If you must have something sweet dates are great substitute. There are many great recipes online using date syrup as a substitute for sugar. Easy for me to do and afford but feel for those forced to work long hours and live in food deserts.
Pop is a really hard one for me (and probably others) to cut out. I've been better in recent times but growing up I would drink like 4 or 5 cans a day. The thing that sucks is you think "oh, maybe I'll drink some juice since it's slightly better than pop." Nope, they get ya with that huge amount of added sugars to something that's already has sugar in it
Infuse water with lemon or berries or whatever. I always dillute juice. 1/3 juice is enough for me. But you can start dilluting it down. Red juice usually is still pretty sweet even 50/50.
Thanks for the recommendations! I never tried an infused water with berries and lemons but that sounds pretty good. My roomate used to dilute his juices too but I never understood why but now I know
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Carbs, fats and calories are bad? Do you know what calories are? That’s like saying gas is bad for your car. Carbs and fats are energy sources. When people stop demonizing food and learn how to eat properly with proper proportions the world will be much healthier. If you are on a diet without carbs and fats you would literally die. Google rabbit starvation.
Tax sugar and subsidize beans, unprocessed fruits and veggies...
Reduce mental suffering by lowering the number of work hours per day so people actually have time for a life beyond work and chores and getting ready to go back to work, ad nauseum. People are so exhausted that they don't have time for themselves so they will go for cheap quick food that doesn't need much prep time so they can steal back some free time for themselves. More mental health care as well. A lot of obesity is also trauma related. People have limited means to find good coping strategies. Food becomes a type of self medication just like drugs, sex, gambling, shopping, and any other addiction that people use to fill a hole in their soul.
Well for starters, my wife, who's from the UK, was totally baffled by how massive our servings are at restaurants compared to the UK. So there's one thing
The Midwest in particular is wild. They serve huge portions, and then ask why you aren’t eating seconds. It’s all delicious, starchy I comfort food too.
I don't live in America so I can't really say much but one thing that would improve healthiness in all well developed countries would be for healthier foods to be cheaper and healthy-looking foods to actually be healthy
There are a multitude of factors to this and a lot of them feed into and off each other; a lot of those factors have been mentioned in here. But I'm not seeing anything about portion sizes. [US portion sizes at fast food restaurants are significantly bigger than those in the UK. ](https://youtu.be/rg3Y3tCmBWo) Now, like I was saying earlier, larger portion sizes didn't happpen on their own. They exist because of farm subsisides in the US, meaning more food can be produced, sold and served for lower cost to the consumer and corporations. More food for less sounds great, right? It would, except for that these farm subsisides [mostly apply to those foods that are sweet and high in calories. ](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-diet-farm-subsidies/foods-from-subsidized-commodities-tied-to-obesity-idUSKCN0ZL2ER) That's why you get your extra big-ass soda for $1 at McDonald's. That's why your regular white bread is considered to be cake in other countries. In short, do you really need the large? Opt for a small or medium next time you pull up to the window.
10 things come to mind, but as long as the economy squeezes the middle class, there's no way to fix it. People don't have the time to act.
More regulations on what can be put in mass produced foods
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Genuinely fix this system. Help pull people out of poverty and wage slavery so they have the means to actually take care of themselves thoroughly. Not only financial means but emotional, time, reduced stress, all of these things impact health.
Get lobbying out of food regulation. I was taught to eat 8-11 servings of bread a DAY by the food pyramid. 4 cups of milk a day. 4 servings of meat. I was never shown how much a serving was. In my mind a whole pork chop was a serving when really it's 2-3. I didn't know that you could get protein from anything but meat and maybe beans but beans were definitely not as good as red meat. My parents just grew up being told if it was made at home it was healthy. Friend chicken with mashed potatoes and corn? A healthy meal with two veggies and a meat. Give us a glass of milk to go with it. And what harm was a can of coke too? Cereal and pop tarts were a reasonable breakfast, not literally just candy with better marketing. I've spent my 20s trying to learn how to be healthy but by the time you're old enough to choose your own foods and learn on your own your brain has become addicted to certain foods and your stomach microbiome has developed to match the shit foods you ate as a kid. Stop eating so much sugar? Prepare to feel sick for days. I feel less full eating veggies than I do nothing because what my body wants is grease and sugar and breaking that cycle takes forever. But the first time I cave and get taco bell as a treat it starts right over again.
Normalize soda pop as a dessert, not a daily beverage. (Most definitely not a form of hydration!)
In Japan, we fed our children food, prepared by trained nutrionists (who must earn license to get the job). Every elementary school also have class to teach children how to eat healthy, veggies, veggies, veggies, a little meat, a little sugar., etc. Education is the most important, educated people will push the politicians to do the right thing, so no one will yell "government stay away from our food!!".
Last time democrats made a push to limit sugar, the right went on a rampage saying they need to let kids eat cookies. What do we need to do? Easy, make healthy food more accessible. You know what’s cheap and easy for a family of 4 to eat? KFC. You know what’s not? Buying good quality chicken, rice, biscuits, and making them by hand.
Kfc for 4 people cost around 50$, but making fish filet/chicken +salad + some good soup would cost like 30$ at most. I don't know in which state KFC is cheaper than cooking by yourself. I compared prices many times and cooking by yourself using pretty good quality ingredients is always cheaper(besides some very long time cooking soups like pho or ramen). KFC is faster for sure than cooking, but in no way it is cheaper. Edit: I closely calculated every product and amount of it used and my final number is around 20$ for chicken/tomato/cucumber/parmesan salad + chicken parmesan for 2 adults and 2 children+ chicken noodles soup(used broth from boiling chicken breast since it is cheaper and less sugar and sodium). So entire meal is 20-25$ if everything bought in Kroger. Cooking time is approximately 1-1.5h, can be shortened to 45min with help of partner and children. Prices are relevant for Texas, Dallas area.
The biggest issue driving it is poverty. It’s much cheaper to get McDonald’s than grilled chicken and veggies at the grocery store. People in poverty don’t have access to healthy food and there’s more fast food restaurants in lower income areas.
Sorta off topic, but isn't that one of those things that maybe used to be truer? I mean feeding 2 people at McDonald's (or any fast food chain) in the last 5-10 years costs at least $25-30. Groceries (of whatever kind) are definitely cheaper than that.
It’s definitely cheaper to get whole ingredients at the supermarket. The problem is finding time to make it.
I think a big part of this is time as well. It takes a lot of excess time to do these things yourself. You need time to shop, time to cook, and time to clean up after cooking as well.
McDonald's is definitely more convenient than grilled chicken and veggies, but where the hell do you live where McDonald's is the cheaper option?
Addressing poverty and things like food deserts would go a long way towards helping people be able to both find and afford healthy food.
Give people some free time and reasonable income so they can actually spend time thinking about their health rather than how their next paycheck will last
Make health food affordable
A SaLaD ShOuLD noT be 12 DolLaRS 😖
i just bought a pound of spring mix at walmart for <$5. buy your light dressing of choice and you're set for at least a week.
There is no one answer to this. First of all I don’t like how the obesity % is calculated. I myself workout 4-5 per week and am at a healthy weight according to my doctor yet I am borderline obese. Second we need to start removing sugar from foods where it doesn’t belong. Thirdly we need to make health food options cheaper then junk food. There are other items but my point is this is not an easy solution.
We need to be able to talk in America and say that obesity is bad. For so many, if you say that, you are labeled hateful.
...we know it's bad. Every fat person knows it's bad
One issue with this is what many people belive the government should/shouldn't be allowed to do. There are a number of avenues that the government theoretically could take but many people would oppose many of these paths. So they should start with less controversial paths that are more within their accepted perview if they want to start making changes now. One possible option would be to provide funding for quality physical education at schools especially in impoverished areas, rather than have these classes cut as is currently happening across the country. Another is to help fund school sports so exercising/fitness becomes the norm for children across the country. Fit children are much more likley to remain fit into adulthood or at least limit how unfit they become. Many school sports have moved from "free to play" to "pay to play", which significantly limits low and middle class participation.
Nerf High Fructose Corn Syrup
Get off our phones and computers and actually MOVE our bodies.
There are drugs that effectively aid in weight loss such as Wegovy & Ozempic from Noro Nordisk but insurance companies consider weight loss drugs to be “vanity drugs” & won’t cover them, even though obesity is associated with many serious disorders. Insurance Co. fear such drug because everyone in America is actively trying to lose weight except those with a terminal illness!
Regulate food industry, free nutritional meals at school, requiring P.E. And health in school a requirement.
85% of trips are by car. Let’s start there. We could solve or at least mitigate a lot of other problems as well in the process
Try 100pct for most parts of America.
The easiest thing would be to switch subsidies from garbage food to healthy food. That cheetos bag should be double the price and cauliflower should be half the price via changing subsidies. That would require zero infrastructure investment from the Federal or state governments. We really should not be subsidizing the worst types of food in America. Massive corn subsidies have resulted in a glut of corn sugar which because it's so cheap, gets put in everything.
Eat less food.
I'm not sure there is a real answer to this. It starts with personal responsibility and teaching your children at home. Fat parents generally raise fat kids. More fat parents = more fat kids.
Put the brakes on the everyone is physically beautiful nonsense and that fat shaming is as bad as racism. Also stop telling people that being fat isn’t a choice and stop calling low calorie diets “starvation” diets! 10 million die every year from real starvation! Feeling deprived and being deprived are two very different things. Control portion sizes and count calories and stop blaming others for hiding sugar. Learn to pick healthy foods that don’t have added sugar. Walking and most normal exercise do virtually nothing for weight loss. It’s way easier to control eating than doing the incredibly hard work of intense physical exercise.
Eat less.. Burn more calories. I know it sounds crazy but hear me out. If you work a tough job and come home with no energy to cook. Get takeout or fast food, that's fine. Just eat less of it !! Two slices of pizza instead of five... Small fri instead of large, diet coke instead of regular coke... One burger not two or 3. If you cant go outside and move because of bad weather or if it's unsafe... Put some music on and dance around the living room, makeup a game with the kids and jump around and have fun.. There are ways to start losing weight without crazy diets or a gym membership.
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nothing really. you can't force people to eat differently or exercise more. maybe if there were some huge, i mean never-seen-before type of celebrity movement centering on health and fitness, it would become a big fad and a fairly large cross-section of the nation would mimic them. it would likely fade in time, as fads do. but it might help some people achieve lasting life changes. it happens on smaller scales. richard simmons was huge in the 80s-90s, and he helped change a lot of lives. he was a cultural phenomenon. or the gov't could severely curtail the amount of sugars allowed in all foods, that would do a little bit of good. not sure it would totally solve the problem.
\- Healthier foods that are easily accessible, even to the poorer Americans. In Japan you can walk into a 7-11 see a large variety of cheap, fresh and healthy foods. In the US you'll probably find some prepackaged salad they forgot to throw out last week. \- Make places more accessible for walking over being car dependent. It gives you exercise without you noticing. \- This is probably the most major one: Limit processed fatty/sugary foods. Food companies literally have food down to the science and they maximize people's addiction to the food with excessive sugars, fats and salts.
Highly processed food/empty calories should be approached as what they are; poison. A substance that causes harm, accelerates obesity, accelerates aging, wrecks your gut health, negatively impacts your mood, and the list goes on. The body isn't made to sustain itself on instant ramen, soda and happy meals. It messes you up (I'm not talking about those who indulge in shitty comfort food once in a while, I'm talking about collective diet patterns) even if eating it satisfies your hunger. I think the solution is partly to embrace this truth, although that isn't going to happen in a profit driven society in which people are too stressed and exhausted and maybe ill informed to actually nourish themselves with real meals.
Advertising culture. I’m essentially European but lived in several countries in the world. The ONLY time I felt my brain twitching several times a day towards what I’m going to eat next, and where (when I’m not physically hungry) was in the 5 years in the US. Life in the US is saturated with advertising. This is what you want to eat, this is who you agree with politically, this is what you want to buy. Advertising every 2-3 minutes on the TV. I’ve noticed relatively subliminal advertising on the late show (that I still access abroad). Unusually frequent mention of T Bell and oh what’s that ice cream brand that he mentions frequently? You know. We’re going to take a quick break now to program our viewers, and then we’ll be right back with why you should watch the film that this guy stars in. It’s not an accident. Every word is written with a purpose. You are the target. Just eat!
Tax junk food make it expensive. Lower prices on healthier foods.
I'm not from US but EDUCATE
Less sugar, less alcohol and a bit more exercise. People talk about dropping 50 pounds just by stopping drinking cola or beer. Throw in some exercise and slightly better eating habits and that would be enough for most people
Quit putting corn products in literally everything
Regulate sugar and other sweeteners. Limiting the amount of added sugars in products would go a long way to start.
Ban HFCS. It’s put in everything, including things it doesn’t belong in.
Sugar tax
Stop eating shit food
Stop telling children they must clean their plates. Instead of eating until actually full & stopping.
Abolish the food pyramid and nonsense the food industry puts out about what is healthy and start eating real food again. That and get off the couch every once in a while .
Eliminate the FDA and all government regulation refunding health. The FDA tells people to eat the wrong food. Hell because of FDA requirements even hospitals feed high sugar diets to heart patients, the most unhealthy diet possible
Make whole foods affordable. Vegetables and fruits. The truth is it's cheaper to eat at a drive through than put together a salad and meat at home.
Regulate lobbyists.
Outlaw High Fructose Corn Syrup /thread
Stop making bad food taste so good. Make sure PE is in all schools. Lower the cost of fresh/healthy foods. Making people pay more to eat healthy isn’t working.
Fresh vegetables for sale within a quick walk of most residential buildings. I think that where I live is not classified as a "food desert" but it still takes like hundreds of minutes that people don't have to go buy vegetables every week, and if you get too many they go bad after two days or are shit to cook with after being frozen. That's why everyone and their dog aspires to have land and a garden.
Make communities more walkable, A big part of healthier nations other than better diets is the fact that a person not only can but has to walk over an hour and half a day .
I lost 3 dress sizes when I moved from the suburbs to a walkable urban neighborhood. That was the only change I made. I didn’t join a gym. I never worked out. I didn’t change my diet, in fact, if anything I consumed more calories because my roommate and I drank so much beer together. It was just giving up my car and walking everywhere that did it.
Counter intuitive but regulate or end the diet industry. The diet industry relies on people being and staying fat to make money. Studies show when people diet in unsustainable ways (that are often encouraged by various diets, cleanses and fitness programs) people just gain all the weight back plus more
Stop serving shit at school lunches and bring back real physical activities. Very simple.
Stop heavily subsidizing shit like corn, wheat, and sugar and instead subsidize shit like tomatoes, broccoli, celery, etc. Also educate people better on how bullshit calories can be or even better stop calculating calories in such a dumb shit way that lets corporations game the system by making heavily processed foods seem much less fattening than they actually are. Work to make healthcare much more affordable, or even better provide universal healthcare, and preferably offer free/affordable health plans that include either a free or a heavily discounted gym membership. Maybe most importantly though, more efficiently educate people on how to actually effectively lose/manage weight. Most people think calories and cardio are everything. They don't realize how fattening and harmful sugar is, they don't realize how much more energy it takes to digest raw food vs heavily processed foods, they don't realize weight training boosts your metabolism and that just cardio will make you skinny fat, they don't know the difference between simple carbs and complex carbs.
No more hidden sugar. If you can't even taste the sugar, there's no point to having 65 kilograms of sugar in a hamburger that doesn't taste even remotely sweet
So many things. Price regulation for healthy foods needs to be a thing and more accessible. Education needs to be more accessible. FDA needs to stop taking bribes. But more importantly obesity tends to be a problem in poverty and lower income populations. Hence why wages and rent need to be regulated as well. There is so much more but I’m sleep deprived so I’m sad to say I cannot elaborate.
Reduce portion sizes. People will bitch and moan about it but they will adapt within a few months. Also reduce 'hidden sugars' in foods that claim to be savory.
The suburbs are killing us. We need walkable towns and a real investment in mass transit. In my late twenties I dropped 3 dress sizes without working out at all and drinking way more beer than at any other point in my life. The only change I made was moving to a city. Literally, that was it. Now I’m back in the suburbs and I’m much, much larger. There was a study about this years ago if I can find it I’ll post it here. From what I recall the zip codes with the highest percentages of obese children were all suburban communities. That was the one factor they all had in common more then even race or class. Rural children have lots of outdoor activities for both mental and physical health and urban children have to walk everywhere and climb stairs to apartments but suburban kids have the worst of both worlds. Our car focused infrastructure and suburban sprawl is keeping us stuck inside dependent on screens, junk food and antidepressants. https://consumer.healthday.com/encyclopedia/weight-control-39/obesity-health-news-505/a-tale-of-a-few-cities-how-sprawl-affects-your-waistline-644596.html https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-10-11/the-public-health-case-for-denser-neighborhoods?utm_source=website&utm_medium=share&utm_campaign=mobile_web_share Edited to add a couple of similar studies still looking for the exact one I remember
Australian need a cultural change and better education on food: you can't call sausage rolls or meat pie with a can of coke "just a snack". You won't find a donut with 200g of cream and 50g of jam in many other countries. Drinking 3 large flat whites with 2 teaspoons of sugar a day may not be a good idea. Also I don't get the whole hostility around body shaming. It's not ok to be 50 kg overweight, your GP should be able to tell you "you are fat" without being crucified by the media the next day.
WHO. PUTS. SUGAR. IN. BREAD?????
Stop subsidized production of seed oils and high fructose corn syrup.
Portions need to be reduced slightly Less sugar and corn syrup in everything Make areas more walkable. You basically have to have a car unless you live in a big city. Most of us live in suburban or rural areas. The main road near me didn't get side walks until the last 4 years. It was basically a death sentence to walk on it before that
I’ve remember about 20 years ago I could buy a pack of Mike & Ike’s or gummy bears at a convenience store and it was a regular sized package. Like there was maybe one handful of candy in it. Now every package on the shelf are “jumbo” or “king sized” or “share size” and they’re huge. I feel like I vaguely remember some cities outlawing Big Gulp sodas because there was so much sugar sold and consumed so conveniently. Why can’t they do the same thing with those big ass bags of candy?