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Eva Sarver
Andrew Davis
English 1113
Obesity is a very wide subject to talk about in America because it has been around since
before the 1960s, that's almost over fifty years. Since the topic has been around for long there are
many books and journals dedicated to talk specifically about obesity, which all give different
angles and opinions on the subject from weather or not obesity is genetic to how the obese
person goes through the struggles of living their everyday life. Through several of these articles I
have gathered that obesity is a disease that affects millions of people worldwide and can affect
anyone, even becoming life threatening to those not paying attention to their health but the high
obesity rates can be lowered starting individually which will slowly lower the number globally.
Obesity can be defined several ways but it originally started out being derived from Latin
as “obesus” which weirdly enough meant lean, which is the exact opposite as you think of obese
people these days, but the Latin word gradually changed to mean overweight (Rynearson, 3).
Obesity however isn’t just overweight it's excessively overweight, and is classified as a disease
unlike being overweight, you can test for the difference between obesity and being overweight
several different ways. One way of testing is using body mass index or BMI, an adult with a BMI
higher than twenty-five is overweight and thirty or higher being obese (Alston, 2). Although
some people do say that the BMI isn’t the best way to test for obesity because the BMI doesn’t
take in consideration the age, bone density and does not directly measure body fat so it has been
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Even though, It is extremely difficult for every journal to track down and calculate
everyone who is obese, many journals just have rough estimates of who is obese. To start with a
bigger picture of how many people are obese “worldwide, in 2014 about 2 billion adults were
overweight and 600 million people had obesity” (Levine, 1523) those number don’t include
children and might be worldwide but there still triple digits in the millions. In those millions, one
third of adult Americans are obese and a further one-third or more that are overweight today,
which have only been rising since 1976 (Alston, 2). A newer discussion about is graphically
where obesity rates are higher in America was brought up in 2011 was whether or not low-
income communities has a higher obesity rate than the higher-income communities. One study
showed that over one third of the Washington DC district who are African American or low
income earning of fifteen thousand or less are obese. The study also showed that one in five
children in the same district were obese (Talib, 1). Each study about who's more obese and how
many people are obese might vary between each study but they all appear to have one thing in
Obesity is a disease that does come with many health-related complications like “The
metabolic and systemic abnormalities associated with obesity lead to conditions such as
disease, and death.” (Alston, 2). There is also an increased risk in any type surgical operation on
an obese person to try and fix most of these symptoms. However, one of the biggest
complications from obesity is death and it is talked about in A heavyweight battle over CDC's
Obesity Forecast when they talk about the number of obesity related deaths in America, the
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article starts out with an estimated four hundred thousand deaths but ends with one hundred and
twelve thousand deaths per year the numbers (Courzin, 770). There is a drastic gap between
those number because it is so difficult to estimate how many people are actually dying from
obesity versus a person existing condition. The same article also explains that the death rate from
obesity is decreasing because there are medical improvements in treating cardiovascular diseases
related to obesity. Other than cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, death however there are several
other diseases related to obesity including but not limited to knee osteoarthritis, sleep apnea, and
gastroesophageal reflux disease. Some of these symptoms however are said to take place over a
prolonged effect of obesity and can sometimes not be reversed after having the symptom over an
Along with the diseases that can come from obesity there can be other non-physical
reactions from obesity like mental symptoms. An obese person may feel a social stigmatism, or
outcast because of their excessive weight, one example is being shamed by airplane companies,
having to buy more than one seat for themselves because they are too big for just one seat. An
obese person will most likely also have a higher health care rate as well, because some
companies feel that they are more liable so they raise their prices because of the health
Obesity can start out simply by just gaining a couple of new pounds and months or years
uncontrollable amount of weight gaining overtime is caused from an unbalanced energy input,
caused by eating more calories than you are burning on a daily routine for an extended amount of
time. There are many reasons for inputting more calories than you are burning such as
overeating, a decrease in physical exercise or just not realizing you're in taking too many
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calories. The opposite is said for losing weight, there needs to be the burning of more calories
than you intake. Which is said to be a different number for everyone showed in a study in the
book obesity, “The average intake was 2570 calories per day. Even with this generous diet, the
loss of weight was 0.5 pounds per day.” (Rynearson, 47). In order to keep the weight off after
getting to the desired weight the number of calories and the amount of exercise to be neutral as to
To change the high rates of obesity it must first start individually because such large
percentages of obesity in just America alone cannot be solved in a week and especially
worldwide since it does take time and effort to lose weight it will take years to even put a dent in
the number. There are several ways for an obese person to lose weight however, some people
may lose the weight for a short period only to gain it back later after a failed crashed diet, instead
the goal should be to lose the weight slowly and keep it off.
However, If a severely obese person is having difficulty losing weight to where it has
become hazardous to their health to not do something about their excess weight a physician
might recommend bariatric surgery, which is not like liposuction which is used to remove fat to
sculpt the body for cosmetic reasons. Bariatric surgery is a fat removal surgery to help a person
lose weight they cannot through diet and exercise, these are usually people with a BMI of greater
than forty. Bariatric surgery is a weight loss surgery that can be performed several different
ways, from a sleeve gastrectomy, adjustable gastric band, or the most common is a gastric
bypass. However, with these surgeries can come lots of responsibility, in post and pre-operation
care and a new diet that must be followed after surgery. One example of the diet that is needed to
be followed before and after surgery is eliminating caffeine, staying hydrated, not eating large
meals but having snacks throughout the day but not skipping a meal. It is also said that to
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increase the surgery’s effectiveness the person should lose five to ten percent of their current
A person with less than a BMI of forty without the option of a bariatric surgery will need
to lose weight directly through diet and exercise. However, it will take a lot more time and be a
lot harder than a bariatric surgery. There are several different options out there to help them,
there are specialist out there to specifically help people lose weight like personal trainers and
dietitians. Everybody is different so not everyone will need different workouts and eating plans
and a specialist can help a person find their perfect balance between the two to help lose weight
and keep it off. If a person cannot afford help from a professional there are several books and
free online resources they can use and still lose weight.
America alone has an insanely high obesity rates and to change that it takes hundreds of
small changes in the way we operate as a country. There are several options to help lower the
rates the first thing to do is to look into why some of the wealthier countries have the higher
obesity rates however, studies show that some of the poorest Americans are the most obese
(levine, 1523). Another option to help lower rates is to look at children and adolescent obesity
rates and how to lower them, one study found the one in five children are obese (Talib, 1). Even
though trying to help lower America's obesity rates raises more questions than answers, these
questions help raise awareness that the obesity is a disease that can cause painful symptoms.
Raising awareness about obesity is important because every day Americans might not know the
difference between being overweight and obesity, or what a BMI is. Raising awareness can for
obesity can help people understand what a healthy BMI is and how to help lower their BMI if it
is too high.
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conscientiousness can be enormous from the symptoms it causes to a person's body to the effect
it can have on the total amount of obesity rates worldwide. Even though obesity has been around
for over fifty years the rates seem to keep increasing worldwide, with more and more people
becoming obese means we keep finding knew symptoms of obesity, from cardiovascular
diseases to diabetes. However, one of the deadliest symptoms we know that can come from
obesity is death. In order to lower the obesity rates, it has to start with the individual people and
work its way up to each country and then in the end the numbers will show nationally. Treating
obesity can take time and hard work but in the end, it will be worth it especially if you never
have a BMI of over forty so you don't have to have a life changing surgery.
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Works cited
Alston, Julian The Effect of Farm and Food Policy’s on Obesity in the United States. New
Couzin, Jenifer. “A Heavyweight Battle Over CDC’s Obesity Forecast”. AAAS, 308. 57230,
Kusher, Robert. Dr.Still christopher Nutrition and Bariatric Surgery CRC press, 2014. Print
Levine, James A. "Solving Obesity without Addressing Poverty: Fat Chance". Journal of