Obesity
Overweight and obesity are two different issues. Overweight means to weigh too much. On the other hand, obesity is having too much body fat. Overweight can result from large muscles, body water, fat, and or bones. In similarity, both come because of having a body weight exceeding the required weight for human beings. Individuals have different amounts food that they eat, hence the amount of calories. Therefore, consuming more calories than the amount in use results in obesity. “It is a fact to say that the world number of obesity patients has doubled since 1980. Adults from the age of 20 and above had overweight issues in the year 2008. This resulted to around 1.4 million casualties from which 200 million and 300 million were males and females respectively. 11 percent of the males were obese with around 35 percent being overweight” (Gillespie, 2013). Moreover, we live in the countries where obesity and overweight are killer diseases than underweight. In addition to cultural and psychological factors, four motives that affect the customer’s decision are quality, price, taste, and convenience.
A greater number of humans under the age of five years are obese. Most importantly, obesity is preventable. The main causes of obesity are the energy imbalance between the calories consumed and the calories used. This imbalance has been an advocation of the retail shops that do exist worldwide. “Since the producers of food are in business, it prompts them to produce these foods in large quantities because of the increasing customer base” (Gillespie, 2013). Their target is to make more profits than the previous financial years, but not the health of their customers: consumers. These foods that have high-fat content are usually shown as advertisements on televisions. The same companies that pay for the advertisements are the ones do the production and supply services. Therefore, they go ahead to encourage the consumers to do their shopping in bulk. “This is in consideration to their competitors who produce low-fat content foods, and their main aim is outdoing them by all means, as well as making substantial profits. Furthermore, there is an increase in the physical inactivity due to many changed forms of working” (Gillespie, 2013). Unfortunately, many people all over the world prefer sitting and watching television programs or working in the office all day rather than take a thirty-minutes break for exercising.
Most of the countries have seen increased urbanization. The changes from the normal hard works have increased the number of individuals being casualties of obesity. Change needs to be effected. “To counteract the nature of work, individuals need to exercise more to bring the energy intake and expend balance” (Lavie, 2014). The nature of obesity as a medical disease is long lost, and it has become the most common disease. It has replaced the infectious diseases and the under nutritious diseases as the chief contributor to ill health. The exact problem is the changes in physical and dietary activities due to the environmental and social shifts associated with developments and limited policies in the health sectors. The pressing need for criteria for evaluating weight loss programs stems from the scope of the problem of obesity in most of the countries. “The prevalence of overweight and obesity is rising, not falling, among most population groups as characterized by gender, race, and age” (Lavie, 2014). Obesity generally belongs to the medical class of problems. In particular, obesity is associated with diabetes mellitus, sleep breathing disorders, coronary heart disease, and certain forms of cancer. Further, the global epidemic of this disease is because of a combination of increased availability of energy food, genetic susceptibility, and decreased physical activities. Moreover, obesity should not be graded simply as a cosmetic problem affecting certain persons, but an epidemic that threatens global well-being.
The obesity epidemic is one of the world’s major health problems. “Adult obesity rates have doubled since 1980, from 15% to 30% while childhood obesity rates have more than tripled. Rising obesity rates have significant health consequences” (Gillespie, 2013). This has contributed to increased rates of more than thirty serious diseases. These conditions create a major strain on the health care system. More than one-quarter of health care costs are now related to obesity.
“Obesity is more than simply an individual problem; it has become a community problem. It drives up health care costs and decreasing productivity” (Lustig, 2014). Failure to take quick and good care of this problem at its initial stages leads to more deadly diseases like diabetes mellitus and cancer. Therefore, it is advisable that it should be prevented at the initial stages. Obesity is preventable, as an individual is required simply to have a balance between the consumed calories and the used calories. The cost of solving the obese issue varies depending on the stage. In the first stage, an individual may indulge into various physical exercises to tone down the fat content in the body.
A broad range of policy actions and programs has been implemented to help reduce the upsurge of obesity globally. They include policies such as the development of national clinical guidelines, nutrition labeling on packed foods, and calorie labelling on the restaurant packets. “Further, there are efforts of educating the masses through the social media marketing efforts and the government’s efforts to increase access and financing for fruits and vegetables” (Lustig, 2014). Communities can play a huge role in improving the healthy choices through efforts like complete streets and safe routes to school, as well as increasing access to healthier foods in schools and in the community. Family individuals also should advise their partners or counterparts to live healthy by eating the right choice of food and going for exercises.
In conclusion consumers are the players when it comes solving the obesity problems. The customers make individualistic choices about the type and quantity they eat at any given time. “If the consumer can be influenced by comprehensible nutrition information for several healthy food choices, then the problem of obesity can be an issue of the past” (Lustig, 2014). Perhaps individuals should begin to debate on the weight gain on an individual level. As mentioned in the introduction, the four factors of quality, price, taste and convenience have proved to be the main aspects in the increased rates of obesity being recorded all over the world.
References
Lustig R. Fat Chance: The Hidden Truth about Sugar, Obesity and Disease, Fourh Estate, 2014. Print.
Lavie, J. Carl. The Obesity Paradox, Scribe Publications, 2014, Print.
Gillespie David. The Sweet Poison Quit Plan, Penguin, 2013. Print.
