The New Ab(normal): Obesity then and now

The great American road trip is an essential part of most summers. And it wouldn’t be complete without stopping off for a bite to eat along the way. But, not only are healthy options on the highway often hard to find, the amount of food we’re served has gotten a lot bigger.

Interesting correlation?

What happens is, you get fat, and that’s precisely what we’ve done. In 1900 the average weight of a college-age male in the U.S. was 133 lb. (60 kg); the average woman was 122 lb. (55 kg). By 2000, men had plumped up to 166 lb. (75 kg) and women to 144 lb. (65 kg). And while the small increase in average height for men (women have remained the same) accounts for a bit of that, our eating habits are clearly responsible for most. Over the past 20 years in particular, we’ve stuffed ourselves like pâté geese. In 1985 there were only eight states in which more than 10% of the adult population was obese — though the data collection then was admittedly spottier than it is now. By 2006, there were no states left in which the obesity rates were that low, and in 23 states, the number exceeded 25%. Even those figures don’t tell the whole story, since they include only full-blown obesity. Overall, about two-thirds of all Americans weigh more than they should.

Read more here from TIME.

Even off the highway, in our very own communities, it’s not always easy to find healthy, smaller-sized meals. Servings everywhere have grown, along with our waistlines.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and its partners have tips on how we can make healthier options more available in our community. Big portion sizes have become the new abnormal, and it’s time to scale back.

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Tags: body weight, childhood, diet, new abnormal, north american, nutrition, obesity, obesity epidemic