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Fighting obesity

Obesity and especially childhood obesity are fast taking on epidemic proportions in Australia. This causes a lot of suffering, and puts a lot of stress on the medical system. Encouraging cycling is part of the solution to this problem.

The obesity epidemic

  • Health professionals define "overweight" as being too heavy overall, while "obese" specifically refers to having too much body fat. Men with over 25% of body fat and women over 30% are considered obese.

  • Sixty five percent of men and 45% of women are now overweight or obese, an increase of around 15% for both sexes since 1980.

  • Over 5% of children are obese and 14 to 18% are overweight. These children have a very high probability of progressing to adult obesity.

  • From 1985 to 1995, the number of Australian children who were overweight or obese more then doubled.

Are you obese?

Measuring body fat is not easy, so BMI (body mass index) is used instead...

BMI = weight / (height x height)

Example: if you weigh 68kg and are 1.8 metres tall, your BMI is 68 / (1.8 x 1.8) = 20.9.

BMIResult
18.5 to 25 Normal
25 to 30 Overweight
30 or more Obese

Why obesity is bad

  • Being obese increases your chance of getting a range of health problems...

    DiseaseIncrease in chance
    Heart disease 40%
    Type 2 diabetes 30%
    Arthritis 70%

  • Being overweight rather then obese lowers your chance of getting arthritis, but no by much: 50% instead of 70%.

  • Type 2 diabetes is not a nice disease - complications include heart disease, stroke, limb amputation, kidney failure and blindness.

  • Being obese doesn't do your self esteem any good either.

  • Overweight and its associated illnesses also create a huge financial burden for Australian society - the true costs may now be as high as $1.3 billion per year and rising fast.

Cycling and obesity

To prevent obesity, increased physical activity and a healthier diet are needed.

Walking or cycling to work, or to school, builds increased physical activity right into your daily habits, making it more likely you'll keep it up over the long run.

Seeing the enormous cost to society of overweight and obesity, investing in bike paths, bike parking, etc. make good economic sense.

We also owe it to Australian children to prevent them from becoming obese.

Sources