Obesity

For the last topic I chose to discuss obesity, because I feel it is one of the most prominent and pressing social problems that United States (and Mexico) are facing. Two-thirds of adults in the United States are regarded as overweight and obesity is the second biggest cause of preventable deaths in the United States (Mooney, Knox, & Schacht, 2013).

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tasneem-bhatia-md/childhood-obesity-_b_3932559.html

Bhatia, T. (2013, September 19). Another Angle on Childhood Obesity -- Empower the Child. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tasneem-bhatia-md/childhood-obesity-_b_3932559.html

This link will take you to a Huffington Post article written by Tasneem Bhatia, M.D. wherein she discusses the obesity problem in America. However, more importantly she offers a way to try to solve the problem, which is empowering the child. She calls for a curriculum in schools that teachers self control, discipline and respect for the body, and I agree with her on this front.

I chose this picture to symbolize obesity because it displays some statistics about childhood obesity, but it also shows how to attempt to solve the problem (daily activity, limiting junk food, being supportive, etc.)

This video from the Oprah Winfrey Network (OWN) posted to YouTube describes the topic of obesity because it focuses on an individual's fight with obesity, more specifically, morbid obesity, which has a higher risk for developing diabetes and heart disease.

"The lack of access to proper nutrition is not only fueling obesity, it is leading to food insecurity and hunger among our children." - Tom Vilsack

This quote by Tom Vilsack represents my feelings on obesity because it shows how not only is obesity a major problem but shows how it can affect other social problems, such as hunger. This is important because it shows how large of a problem obesity really is.

http://www.cdc.gov/obesity/data/adult.html

This link directs to a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention site regarding obesity facts among adults which I think is important to understand as in this post I have discussed mostly childhood obesity, but adult obesity is a major problem as well.

http://www.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/americas/01/04/mexico.obesity/

This link will take you to a CNN article and video about how obesity is a problem in Mexico as well. I wanted to include this because it shows how obesity is not just a problem in the United States but that it is a problem on the global scale.