Kill Obesity Today Before It Kills You Tomorrow

Editor’s note: The high prevalence of diet-related diseases, like obesity, is on the increase worldwide. Oladele Hakeem, Naij.com editor, writes on why people should prevent or get rid of obesity by maintaining a healthy lifestyle. Oladele Hakeem also wrote articles like: Buhari’s Ministers: Is It New Wine In New Bottle; Why Igbo Presidency Has Been Unachievable Since 1979; Buhari’s Appointments: Competence Vs Tribal Lineage among other articles across various fields.

an obese woman

Obesity and its assessment

Obesity is when an adult has a BMI (body mass index) greater or equal to 30.0. BMI is calculated by taking a person’s weight in kilogrammes (kg) and dividing it by the person’s squared height in metres.

Obesity for a particularly country is calculated by using what is called, ‘’Adult Prevalence Rate (APR).’’ APR gives the percentage of a country’s population considered to be obese.

People eat all types of food. However, some do not watch the composition of what they eat. They eat just anything without minding its nutritional contents.

Some foods are known as slow oxidisers, while others are called fast oxidisers. Slow and fast oxidisers are foods that generate low and high energies respectively during digestion. It should also be known that no single diet takes care of everybody. This means that what might be a factor for obesity in someone might not be so for another person.

RSEH do kill obesity

RSEH simply stands for “rest, sleep, exercise and healthy diet.” RSEH are like the four cardinal points on a compass.  They give the direction to whether a person would be obese or not. It is important to work out a schedule on how to maintain a proper RSEH. This is because people are becoming obese these days because they do not take RSEH into consideration.

People eat basically for two reasons. These are to get energy and nutrients.

A healthy diet is also known as a balanced diet. A balanced diet contains all the six classes of food (carbohydrates, proteins, fats and oils, minerals, vitamins and water) in the right proportion. Some nutritionists believe the composition of balanced diet should be 40% carbohydrates, 25% proteins, 25% fats and oils and 10% of the remaining classes of food.

Carbohydrates are actually responsible for obesity and not fats. The escape route from obesity is to cut down heavy carbohydrates. However, complex carbohydrates like millets and oats are okay.

Obesity and BMI

In the United States, more than 35% adults are obese, while 17% of children are affected. The figure for the United Kingdom is more mind-boggling. There, 74% of men are said to be overweight, while 64% of females are obese.

According to World Health Organisation, worldwide obesity has more than doubled since 1980. No fewer than 2.1 billion people of the world’s population were obese in 2014. The figure has gone higher now.

The last available data on Nigeria puts the country’s obesity prevalence rate at 6.5%.

The graph below shows the various BMI ranges

Graph showing BMI type

The table below shows the various BMI ranges. This table clearly indicates when someone gets to the obesity state.

BMI	CLASSIFICATION	INTERPRETATION
Less than 18.5	Underweight	Underweight
18.5 – 24.9	Normal	Healthy weight
25.0 – 29.9	Overweight	Overweight
30.0 – 34.9	Obesity (Class I)	Obese
35.0 – 39.9	Obesity (Class II)	Obese
More than 40	Extreme obesity (Class III)	Obese

Metabolic syndrome (MS)

A person is said to suffer from metabolic syndrome if he or she has at least three of the following five medical conditions:

1. Abdominal (central) obesity
2. Elevated blood pressure
3. Elevated fasting plasma glucose
4. High serum triglycerides
5. High density lipoprotein (HDL)

The fact about MS is that it has a strong association with obesity. Thus, an obese person is predisposed to so many health challenges in which MS is among. As MS is believed to be caused by underlying disorder of energy utilisation and storage, which are all common with obesity.

Other associated health challenges of obesity include developing cardiovascular diseases and diabetes.

Oladele Hakeem, a content editor with Naij.com, holds a BSc (Hons) from UNILAG, a PCWC from NIJ and an MSc in Epidemiology and Medical Statistics from UI. He writes from Ikeja, Lagos.

The views and opinions expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of Naij.com.

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