HBO recently put together this mind-blowing 4-Part documentary series on the obesity epidemic in America called The Weight of the Nation. Best of all? You can watch them FOR FREE just by clicking on the links below.
Taking the time to learn about the weight problem facing you and your munchkins is the first step in finding a solution!
Grab some popcorn, click, and learn!
The first film in The Weight of the Nation series
examines the scope of the obesity
epidemic and explores the serious health consequences of being
overweight or obese.
The obesity epidemic is a problem that’s
emerged over the last 30 years. It threatens our
nation’s social, economic and physical health. But, unlike a natural disaster, obesity is
often preventable. Although overall obesity prevalence rates appear to be leveling off,
there are still far too many Americans who are overweight or obese and who continue to
develop health problems as a result. In order to end the epidemic, everyone must be part of the solution.
nation’s social, economic and physical health. But, unlike a natural disaster, obesity is
often preventable. Although overall obesity prevalence rates appear to be leveling off,
there are still far too many Americans who are overweight or obese and who continue to
develop health problems as a result. In order to end the epidemic, everyone must be part of the solution.
At the level of our
DNA, we’re programmed to eat as much as we can to survive and store
the extra as fat for future energy use. In a world where calorie-dense,
sugar-laden and fatty foods are available around every corner, that’s a
problem. The good news is that, even if the propensity to gain weight is
written into our genes, we’re not fated to a lifetime of fat.
The
second film in the series poses a question that almost anyone who’s struggled
with excess weight has
asked, if only in jest: For all the remarkable high-tech tools available to
medicine, for all the billions of dollars in drug research, there’s still no
highly effective medication to prevent or reverse obesity – why?
Researchers
are, in fact, developing and evaluating strategies to help people reach and
maintain a healthy weight, so that they can look forward to healthier
lives. Diet is a part of the equation, but most name-brand diets
promise quick, dramatic rewards and gloss over the long-term effort needed to keep
weight off. Maintaining weight loss is a challenge, and success requires
sustained changes in our food and physical activity.
Weight
– whether we gain it or lose it – is dependent on our body’s energy balance: We
are in balance when we take in and burn off the same number of calories each
day. Take in more calories than we burn, and the pounds add up. Take in fewer,
and the number on the scale goes down.
Childhood
obesity is much more than a cosmetic concern. The health consequences of childhood obesity include greater risk of
heart disease, type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, asthma and other serious
illnesses.
The
combination of these health effects and the dramatic increase in childhood
obesity rates over the past three decades causes some experts to fear this may
be the first generation of American children who will have a shorter life
expectancy than their parents.
Strategies
like cutting out TV and sugar-sweetened drinks may help reduce a child’s weight
or prevent future weight gain, but not always for the reasons we expect. There
is a link between TV watching and overweight
and obesity among children.
While
the act of watching TV – being sedentary and possibly eating snacks while
taking in a favorite show – is part of the problem, experts are now looking at
what kids watch as well. There is a growing debate over the effects of food
marketing on the childhood obesity epidemic and what should be done about it.
Obesity
is a very serious medical condition, no longer viewed as strictly an issue of
cosmetics. It’s a contributing factor in the death and disability of too many
of our neighbors, friends and family members, and its societal costs are
astronomical. Although overall obesity prevalence rates appear to be leveling
off, there are still far too many Americans who are overweight or obese –
approximately one-third of adults are obese and another third are overweight.
Besides
facing an increased risk of premature death, people who are obese are at
greater risk of serious medical conditions that can make them very sick,
potentially subjecting them to constant pain and suffering and diminished
quality of life. Obesity not only drives up health care costs for patients and
families, it costs businesses – and the country – tens of billions of dollars
in lost productivity and higher employee health costs.
While
obesity is often viewed as an issue of personal responsibility, overeating is as much
about biology as it is about psychology. There is much we still
don’t know about the causes of obesity. Biological research has found that
behaviors that are laid down early in life contribute to obesity. Environmental
factors, such as access to safe parks and affordable healthy foods, also play a
role.
