14 Jul

Generational Fat

Published by MacDoctor on July 14th, 2009
8 Comments »

Apparently we are officially the third fattest nation on the planet. Our obesity rate is 26.5% of the population (Mexico is 30% and the US 34.3%). Australia has a rate of 21.7%, but as the Aussies haven’t updated that figure since 1999, I find it as believable as their underarm bowling skills.

Inevitably, the obesity police are out in force, with Ruth Dyson calling National “shallow and short-sighted” for cutting Labour’s precious anti-obesity programs. This is a bit of a cheek considering the rise in obesity continued unabated on Labour’s watch. Ruth is joined by Dr Robyn Toomath, the Fight the Obesity Epidemic spokeswoman who complains that National has “actually reversed minimal nutritional guidelines in schools” (how dare they!). Public health nutritionist Bronwen King adds:

“Current trends to eat more processed foods would lead to obesity and undernourishment, resulting in children unable to reach their full intellectual capacity”

Leigh Sturgiss, executive director of the Obesity Action Coalition, wants tough regulation of what can be advertised to children. Not to be outdone we have Sue “the sky is falling” Kedgley holding forth on the subject:

“Green Party Health spokeswoman Sue Kedgley said the report highlighted the “stupidity” of the Government cutting funding for nutrition programmes and scrapping regulations banning junk food in school cafeterias.”

There is only one small problem with all this agitation from lobbyists to control the nutrition of children. It is all complete nonsense, as this article on some recent research shows.

“There is a strong link in obesity between mothers and daughters and fathers and sons, but not across the gender divide, research suggests.

“A study of 226 families by Plymouth’s Peninsula Medical School found obese mothers were 10 times more likely to have obese daughters.

“For fathers and sons, there was a six-fold rise. But in both cases children of the opposite sex were not affected.

“The researchers believe the link is behavioural rather than genetic.

“Researchers said it was “highly unlikely” that genetics was playing a role in the findings as it would be unusual for them to influence children along gender lines.

“Instead, they said it was probably because of some form of “behavioural sympathy” where daughters copied the lifestyles of their mothers and sons their fathers.”

The conclusions one can draw from this are inevitable:

The primary determinant of fat kids is not school tuck shops, poverty, ignorance of nutrition or lack of exercise – it is the size (and presumably lifestyle) of the primary role model of the child – the parent of the same gender.
All nutritional, education and regulatory efforts aimed at children are likely to be a complete waste of time (which explains the poor results Labour had in their decade of anti-obesity campaigning). This is reinforced by the fact that, contrary to the prevailing myths, 8 out of 10 obese adults were NOT overweight children.
The only effective anti-obesity measure will be to persuade overweight adults to change their lifestyles and lose weight. Note that I say persuade. Banning KFC will not produce slim adults – they will simply find some other comfort food.
For persuasion to have any chance of success, we need to rid ourselves of the prevailing politically correct mollycoddling of overweight people. Fat is not OK. Fat is a damned nuisance. If you are obese, you are more likely to die of a whole host of diseases including heart disease, diabetes and, of course, swine flu. You are less likely to get an accurate diagnosis because your doctor cannot examine you through the layers of fat and most imaging techniques don’t cope very well with adipose tissue either. And if you are over 120 Kg the smaller air ambulance can’t fly you out, the ED beds will collapse and the hospital has to have expensive special beds for you. And that is just a few medical problems off the top of my head.

So let’s all stop trying to make fat people feel good about themselves, naked or otherwise. The MacDoctor is overweight. He is not big-boned. He does not have under-active glands. He does not eat like a bird (unless we are talking Ostrich). He does not engage in various mostly imaginary activities. If fact, the only thing that I have, that could be considered over-active, are my teeth. I am fat. The only person who can do anything useful about fixing this is me. And if you are overweight, you are the only one who can fix it. Not Mr Ryall. Not Ms. Dyson or Ms. Kedgeley. Just you and me.

Hat Tip: Doug Hudson

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