Obesity and fast foods – there’s little doubt about the link. Obesity has reached epidemic proportions in the United states. And it’s an epidemic that has grown side by side, step by step with the the fast food industry.
Eric Schlosser in his brilliant and shocking book, Fast Food Nation, describes the US as “an empire of fat,” and he lays the blame for this clearly and convincingly at the door of the fast food industry.
Obesity Fast Food Data
Twice as many American adults are obese today as in the 1960s. More than half of all adults and a quarter of all children are now obese. Over this same period, fast food has become cheaper and easier to buy.
Further evidence for the link between obesity and fast food can be found outside the US. Since the early 1980s, American-style fast food culture has spread like wildfire around the world… And obesity has followed, accompanied by its many unwelcome side effects: heart disease, diabetes, arthritis and other ills.
Although the negative health effects of cigarette smoking cannot be debated, it remains the single most common cause of preventable deaths. Each year, over 430,000 people die as a result of a smoking related disease. Yet, over 50 million continue to smoke, including over 3 million teens. An estimated three thousand teenagers begin to smoke each day, and one thousand of them will eventually die as a result. According to the American Lung Association, cigarette smoking leads to 87% of lung cancers, emphysema and chronic bronchitis. Healthcare and lost productivity costs of $97.2 billion dollars per years arise from smoking related illnesses. Cigarettes contain over 19 known cancer-causing chemicals in addition to nicotine.