Causes and Effects of Obesity
Obesity is a health condition that raises much concern in the modern society. There is an immense part of the modern society that is subject to obesity. Statistically, this is a condition that has an immense impact on the children and teenagers. These age groups are the most vulnerable in acquiring obese conditions. Obesity is a condition that involves extreme fat contents in the physiological system of a human being. The fat constituents accumulate in the body system as it brings adverse health effects. There is a specific unit that gives a comprehensive description of obesity. It is the BMI. This unit makes a comparison of body weight and height. When it exceeds 30kg/m2, the individual is an obesity victim. These individuals are highly prone to infections such as heart failure and diabetes. Consequently, the life expectancy of such individuals reduces significantly.
Causes of obesity
As connoted previously, the children and teenagers are the most vulnerable groups towards obesity. This fact is attributable to several factors. The modern society has an extreme passion for food contents that they are not entirely familiar with. These are the calories. Children and teenagers consume irregular amounts of calories without having knowledge of their effects. Calorie is a unit that defines the energy content in a food substance. The society consumes high calorie contents unwittingly. This occurs in between the meals. It also occurs during the meals. Consequently, the individuals consume billions of calories that have an adverse effect on their physiological system. Actually, this amounts to obesity in the individuals. Evidently, this is lack of proper knowledge about the diets.
Calories are a common topic in diverse commodities. Foods have clear labels of the calorie contents. Their packs reflect the amounts of calories they contain. The same is applicable in recipes, websites as well as menus. Calorie content is a wide spread topic, but only few individuals have full knowledge about their nature and function. The high rates of obesity are dominantly attributable to the inadequate knowledge. Statistically, the obese children compose a third of the entire population. The obese adults also compose sixty four percent of the entire population. Evidently, this is a substantial figure that perishes in obesity. This elevated figure in obese individuals attributes to the inadequate knowledge in diets.
The socio-economic status of individuals determines their vulnerability towards obesity. In line with this fact, the affluent societies exhibit higher rates of obesity than the poor societies. This is definitely attributable to their feeding habits. In the affluent backgrounds, food is in surplus supply. It is a basic need that seems inexpensive to the affluent societies. Definitely, this does not apply to the poor societies. In the average societies, food is a basic requirement that seems expensive. In this context, the food is in limited supply, and does not reflect a surplus trend. Affluent societies have an ability to visit restaurants, and consume specific forms of food. Their homes engross preserved junk foods. For instance, cookies are a common diet in such society. Some of these individuals are in shock upon reading the calorie contents of their foods. In this case, one cookie might constitute seven hundred calories. These are snacks that the individuals consume frequently in between the meals. From a healthy perspective, the consumption of a single cookie is enough. The meals are additional calories in the physiological system of the individuals. The excessive consumption of the calories leads to obesity. This fact justifies the high rate of obesity in the affluent societies. It is a vivid justification of the statistics that- evaluate the socio-economic factor s against obesity.
Restaurants make a great contribution to the high obesity rates to both children and adults. The risk lies on the nature of foods in the restaurants. Restaurant foods engross high calorie contents consistently. For instance, a pizza might contain two thousand calories. This calorie content is independent of the desert and soda. In reality, this is a very high content of energy ingested in the body. These outlets are business entities that focus on profit and market maximization. Unfortunately, they do not put immense and critical consideration of the diets they offer to clients. Restaurants cannot embrace the principles of health over their priorities to maximize profits and the market. Apart from the restaurants as a major propagation of obesity, there are health claims that elevate obesity rates. These health claims mask the consideration of calorie content in the diets. For instance, low-fat is a common health claim that masks the existence of calories in a diet. This is evident when individuals choose to boycott some diets and making preferences. Their preferences might have a higher calorie content that their initial diet. Individuals do not consider the calorie content of their preferences. Evidently, the health claims are major causes of obesity in the modern society.
Underestimation of food consumption is a common phenomenon in the modern society. Individual assume that they are ingesting minimal contents of calories in their diets. This factor increases the vulnerability of the individuals towards obesity. Such individuals do not have the exact consideration of the calorie content in their diets. They focus on purely assumed figures in the calorie content of their diets. This significant factor increases the vulnerability of the individual towards obesity. For a healthy physiological structure, the individual ought to consider the exact calorie content in their diets. Through the accurate consideration of calorie contents, the individuals can make a plan of their diets. This is a step that would significantly curb the elevated rates of obesity.
As connoted previously, calories define the energy content in the diets. They are subject to consumption after the process of ingestion. For a healthy physiological structure, there ought to be a balance in the intake and consumption of energy contents. Obesity attributes to the imbalance in the intake and consumption of the energy contents. Many children and adults that are prone to obesity ingest high calorie contents and fail to consume them in the body. Such individuals do not undertake exercises that propagate the consumption of the calories. This is one of the common causes of the high rates of obesity. The children ingest high calorie content foods as they do not engage in outdoor activities.
Effects of obesity
Obesity has adverse health effects on the victims. These effects are dominantly due to the excessive fat contents in the physiological structure of the individuals. The victims of obesity have an extremely limited life expectancy. It has an end result of death due to the high fat accumulations in the physiological structure. From a health perspective, excessive fat accumulations in the physiological structure of the individuals are toxic. Obesity also has an adverse effect of heart failure. This is a critical infection that results to demise of the victims. The excessive fat deposits in the physiological structure block the blood vessels and valves. This is the chief attribution to the demise of the victims.
Work cited
Brody, Jane. “Calories Are Everywhere, Yet Hard to Track.” The New York Times. March 19, 2012. Retrieved on March 21, 2012.