Since the '60s Americans have increasingly been bulking up. The average American today weighs about 24 pounds heavier than they did in 1960. The typical woman today weighs 164 pounds and men, statistically, weigh 194 pounds. The 'growing' population has led to larger seats on airplanes, trains, hospital beds and coffins; yet most Americans believe that they and their children are at a healthy weight.

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TOP 5 CAUSES FOR OVERALL WEIGHT GAIN:

  • Antibiotics: Both in food and in medicine it has been proven that the intake of antibiotics can make the body rethink the way that it processes gut bacteria to better absorb nutrients. Antibiotics have long since been given to livestock to plump them up, hello, that is what they are doing to us too. Most researchers believe that antibiotics are over-prescribed.
  • Other livestock fatteners could be causing the increase in human weight. This, however is controversial as many believe the drugs are digested from the animals and do not rest in the meat.
  • Pesticides and other endocrine disrupters: Some antibiotics and artificial sweeteners are similar to endocrine disrupters, the chemicals found in fire retardants and plastics that are finding their way into our food sources.
  • Sugar Substitutes: "When researchers at the University of Texas Health Science Center studied 474 people who drank two or more artificially sweetened soft drinks a day they found the people gained five times as much as those not drinking diet drinks." www.salon.com
  • Industry and government marketing: Basically, the more appealing the look, the more you'll eat; one example of this would be cartoon shaped fruit snacks as compared to non-cartoon shaped snacks, kids were likely to eat more of the former.

Just a nice reminder to watch what you eat and that doesn't just mean french fries.

 

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