Is obesity a big problem?

Is obesity a big problem?

I have divided my presentation in three parts. First I will talkabout obesity (definition and state of obesity in the world). Next I will expose the causes and consequences of obesity, and finally I will discuss possible solutions to this problem

1) What is obesity?

It is an excess of body fat that frequently results in significant deteriorating health.

For adults, overweight and obesity ranges are determined by using weight and height to calculate a figure called the “body mass index” (BMI). BMI is used because, for most people, it correlates with their amount of body fat.
* An adult who has a BMI between 25 and 29.9 is considered overweight.
* An adult who has a BMI higher than 30 is considered obese.

When a person gains weight, hisfat cells first increase in size and then in number. And when a person starts losing weight, the cells decrease in size, but the number of fat cells generally stays the same. This is part of the reason that once you gain a significant amount of weight, it is more difficult to lose it.

A lot of nations suffer from the problem of obesity. Anglo-Saxon Countries are the most affected by this problem. The United States tops the list with 31 percent of the population obese and France is placed 22nd with 9% of obese.
This picture shows that unlike France, , the percentage of the population that is obese has increased dramatically over the last few years in the United States. 


Today children are affected by this problem too. In 2010, more than 42 millions of children are in overweight in the world

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2) What are the causes?

Even if heredity can be a cause of overweight, it is generally also caused by a lack of physical activity, junk food, or both. The increasing of obesity is due to modification of our lifestyle 

Television, computer and video games contribute to children’sinactive lifestyles.In addition, medias encourage them consuming food with a lot of carbohydrate. Snacking increases especially in teenagers.

For the adults, we must also consider that today, the society has evolved, and a lot of people sit all day at work and didn’t do sport.

3) What are the solutions?
physical activity is recommended. For example: swimming, biking, running…
We must reduce the amount of time spent in front of TV, playing video games. It’s better to eat meals together as a family as often as possible and to eat slowly
We must drink water and limit sodas, It’s recommendedto eat at least 5 fruits and vegetables each day.
Specialists say that diet, exercise and drugs alone don’t result in long term weight loss. 
Obesity surgery is the only proven method for obese people to reach normal weight and maintain it. It consists of reducing the capacity of the stomach in order to reduce food intake. 

In any case if you are overweight or obese, you must get appropriate medical help to reduce your weight and avoid the long-term complications associated with excess body fat.

4) The biggest problem of obesity : bad health conditions

Obesity is associated with many illnesses and is directly related to increased mortality and lower life expectancy.
Being overweight or obese increases the risk of many diseases and bad health conditions like

• Hypertension
• Type 2 diabetes
• Stroke
• Sleep apnea and respiratory problems
• Some cancers 

Consequently, overweight and obesity have a significant economic impact on the health care system.
For example in the USA 47 million dollars are spent to address obesity problems and 51 million to combat related diseases.

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