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[Updated on 5-11-09: "finds" in the title]
The EurekAlert article “Increased food intake alone explains the increase in body weight in the United States” states that “… the rise in obesity in the United States since the 1970s was virtually all due to increased energy intake.”
The results of the study were presented on Friday, May 8, 2009, at the 17th European Congress on Obesity (ECO2009), held from May 6-9, 2009, in Amsterdam, Netherlands.
Boyd Swinburn, the lead author in the study, states "There have been a lot of assumptions that both reduced physical activity and increased energy intake have been major drivers of the obesity epidemic. Until now, nobody has proposed how to quantify their relative contributions to the rise in obesity since the 1970s.” [EurekAlert]
Body adds, “This study demonstrates that the weight gain in the American population seems to be virtually all explained by eating more calories. It appears that changes in physical activity played a minimal role.” [EurekAlert]
Dr. Boyd, the chairperson of Population Health (School of Exercise and Nutrition Sciences) at Deakin University (Geelong, Victoria, Australia), is also the director of the World Health Organization’s (WHO’s) Collaborating Centre for Obesity Prevention (CCOP).
Basically, the authors conclude that, based on their study, to reverse the obesity problem in the United States people with weight problems should reduce the number of calories that they take in each day.
To accomplish similar weight loss, they could exercise more each day.
Page two concludes.
In addition, the eating of fewer calories each day and the increasing of physical activities each day, together, would more quickly turn around the growing weight problem in the United States.
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However, what is new is the statement by these researchers that eating more food each day is, alone, the problem of obesity in the United States.
The idea that people are exercising less each day, since the 1970s, does not seem to be a major factor in obesity.
Swinburn and his team found that U.S. children had increased their weight, on average. by four kilograms (nine pounds) over the past three decades, while U.S. adults had added, on average, eight kilograms (17 pounds) to their weight.
The AFP article "Study blames over-eating, not poor exercise for US obesity" states, "For the US population to return to its leaner, 1970s self, children would have to cut their intake by about 350 calories a day -- equal to one can of fizzy drink and a small portion of French fries, and adults by about 500 calories -- the equivalent of a Big Mac burger."
There are a lot of calories in fat-filled French fries, sugared sodas, and fat-filled hamburgers.For more details of their study, please read the EurekAlert article “Increased food intake alone explains the increase in body weight in the United State ,” which was mentioned earlier.
