Saidah McKissick Ms.

Caruso ENGL 1102 09 April 2013

Memo: As geography major, this topic is nothing strange to me. There are disparities in obesity among different socioeconomic statuses but what which people are actually the overweight ones? Is this happening only in America? No, it's happening in Asia, Middle and Latin America, Africa and the Middle East, as well as Europe. I think it's important for people to know why this is happening and to whom. My audience is mostly anyone that does not have any knowledge of why socioeconomics plays a very large role in obesity; not only in the United States but as well as countries abroad. I think that my main target are unsuspecting students because they are more likely not to know anything about socioeconomics.I intend to use a blog, such as one on the popular blogging site Tumblr. Tumblr is notorious for spreading information that people did not know and informing the uninformed opening t heir eyes to the world around them.
http://www.foodproductdesign.com/news/2011/11/disparities-in-obesity-affected-bysocioeconomic.aspx

Wang, Y., and X. Chen. "Socioeconomic Status May Explain Racial Disparities in Diet, Exercise, and Weight." Socioeconomic Status May Explain Racial Disparities in Diet,
Exercise, and Weight. Elsevier, 28 Nov. 2011. Web. 13 Mar. 2013.

Obesity: No Longer A FirstWorld Problem http://theweightofitall.tumblr.com/

Have you ever wondered why people, not only in the United States, are so overweight? Now, has it ever occurred to you that their socioeconomic status plays a part in it. Now, what if I said that the amount of money they have is the only a big reason why their waistlines are expanding year by year. For those out there that think that overweight people are a first world problem you are wrong and, in my opinion, will continue to be wrong. Being overweight is more of a problem in more developed countries, but in less developed countries some people are continuously becoming considerably overweight. Think about the late North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Il and his son Kim Jong-Un. Their country, of almost twenty-five million people, is full of underweight and poor citizens, but these men are definitely on the heftier side. The Kims have a lot of wealth so they should be smaller since they have access to more healthy foods and better healthcare. Right? Not really. Does more wealth lead to more excess? In my opinion and research, not so much in certain cases. In the U.S., the Center for Disease Control (CDC), did research that showed that men with higher incomes tend to be more overweight than men with less income. Inversely, higher income women are less likely to be obese than low income women, but most obese women are not low income. There is significant trend between obesity and education among men. Among women, however, there is a trend, those with college degrees are less likely to be obese compared with less educated women. Let's think globally again. In China, within the last twenty years the economy has gone up but the population's health has significantly declined. More and more children are becoming overweight because parents are spoiling their children since there is a one-child policy in place. So, the parents spend their wealth on their children, no matter what their socioeconomic status is, but it is a bit more prevalent among wealthier Chinese. In urban China, the obesity rate for children went from

12.5% to 20% in less than ten years, but in rural China, projected that 1 in 4 children are obese.(World Trends) Researchers at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill recently discovered that Chinese teenagers have a diabetes rate that is four times higher than teenagers in the United States. Besides, the obese children, adults are hit hard by obesity as well. They have given up bicycles for cars and traditional, healthy Chinese foods for fast foods that can be found at almost every street corner. It is extremely surprising to know that from 1958 to 1961 China had a Great Famine where close to fortyfive million people starved to death, but now people are over eating to death. Moving on a little to the west, there is the country of India. We all should know about India and their caste system. Most of the world considers India to be crowded and full of undernourished and poor people divided into a caste system. It's quite obvious who the more overweight people are India, which are the middle class. Obesity in India has been dubbed an affluent affliction.It's quite obvious who the more overweight people are India. For diabetes and cardiovascular diseases, India is one of the capitals . According to the World Health Organization (WHO), globally, there are more than one billion overweight adults, at least three-hundred million of them clinically obese. Due to economic growth, most of this shift is occurring. People with greater wealth means that bicycles are abandoned for motorbikes and cars, and work in the fields is swapped for sitting at a desk. In rich countries, the share of the population that gets insufficient exercise is more than twice as high as in poor ones.(Big Picture) How about the fact that there are more obese people in the world than there are undernourished. The United Nations (UN) has come up with five strategies to try and combat the amount of obesity and the undernourishment in the world. They suggest taxing unhealthy products regulating foods high in saturated fats, salt, and sugar, cracking down on junk food advertising overhauling misguided agricultural subsidies that make certain ingredients cheaper than others and finally supporting local food production so that consumers have access to healthy, fresh, and nutritious foods.(Rice,Obesity of Hunger)

So what is this telling us? We can not make people forcibly change their habits. It is going to be hard to change a societies problem. We all have the will power to change our habits in order to be healthier, but do we really want to? It's our money and we can spend it however we'd like and on whatever we'd like. Right?

Works Cited

Bruno, Debra. "Health & Science." Washington Post. N.p., 31 Dec. 2012. Web. 07 Apr. 2013.

"Adult Obesity Facts." Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 13 Aug. 2012. Web. 13 Mar. 2013. "The BIg Picture." Economist.com. N.p., 15 Dec. 21012. Web. 10 Apr. 2013. "Obesity and Overweight." WHO. World Health Organization, 25 Mar. 2013. Web. 25 Mar. 2013. Pang, Li. "Obesity Is a Growing Concern in China." - China.org.cn. N.p., 14 Sept. 2012. Web. 07 Apr. 2013. Rice, JIm. "Obesity in a World of Hunger." Sojo.net. Sojourners, May 2012. Web. 10 Apr. 2013. Unnikrishnan, Ambika Gopalkrishnan, Sanjay Kalra, and M. K. Garg. "REFERENCES." National Center for Biotechnology Information. U.S. National Library of Medicine, 02 July 0005. Web. 07 Apr. 2013. Wang, Y., and X. Chen. "Socioeconomic Status May Explain Racial Disparities in Diet, Exercise, and Weight." Socioeconomic Status May Explain Racial Disparities in Diet, Exercise, and Weight. Elsevier, 28 Nov. 2011. Web. 13 Mar. 2013.