Obesity and Health

Report Outline
Growing National Health Problem
Diet and the Social Environment
Changing Approaches to Weight Loss
Special Focus

Growing National Health Problem

Extent and Causes of Obesity in America

Imprisoned in every fat man, British author Cyril Connolly once wrote, “a thin one is wildly signalling to be let out.” In America, that “thin man” is having a hard time escaping. Obesity, long the subject of humor, has become a national health problem involving tens of millions of people and recently drawing congressional attention. During hearings this year by the Senate Select Committee on Nutrition and Human Needs, Chairman George McGovern (D S.D.) called obesity this country's No. 1 form of malnutrition. Not only that, he said, the obese are getting fatter and the number of obese Americans is increasing every year.

The number of Americans who are overweight is largely a matter of conjecture. Some estimates by medical authorities run as high as 80 million. McGovern used the figure 30 million, of which, he said, 15 million “are obese to a degree that actually shortens their lives.” He defined obesity as being 20 per cent overweight based on height, sex and age. However, there are other definitions of obesity in use, and not everyone accepts the prevailing—sometimes diverse—standards of what constitutes “normal” weight. One set of standards that has gained wide acceptance for correlating weight with height and sex was devised by Metropolitan Life Insurance Co.

Regardless of the lack of consensus as to numbers and definitions, there is ample evidence that a sizable part of the U.S. adult population is overweight. The Department of Health, Education and Welfare last fall issued a four-year study it had conducted throughout the nation which found that the average height and weight, for men, was 5 feet 9 inches and 172 pounds and, for women, was 5 feet 3.6 inches and 143 pounds. By HEW's reckoning, the average male weight was 18 pounds heavier than it should have been, and the average female weight was 21 pounds heavier. According to other findings, a sizable number of schoolchildren and draft-age young men also have been overweight.