Obesity Rates Higher in Country than City

by: Stefan Simonovic

Source: Flickr

Apart from those interested in BBW dating, not many of us are aware of just how much obesity there is in the U.S. Moreover, it shouldn’t be strange at all that the obesity rates are pretty high across the country given how much junk food and candy we get into our system every day.

And even though the amount of obese people is more or less justified, we’re pretty sure that nobody knows that the percentage of obesity is higher in rural areas than in cities. With that said, let’s dive deeper into the matter and check what not one, but two analyses have concluded.

Obesity doesn’t care about Age

The study was helmed by Craig M. Hales, MD, Chery D. Fryar, MSPH, and Margaret D. Carrol, MSPH, who work at the National Center for Health Statistics, the US Public Health Service and the National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, respectively.

They took two groups – adults and children – and compared their height, weight and living location over the course of 5 years, from 2001 to 2006. They have compiled the results and published them on the JAMA Network recently, pointing out to an unexpected fact: there are more obese people in the country than in the city.

For example, when it comes to women, about 38% of those who live within a population greater than a million were obese, while that number goes up to 42.5% in populations smaller than a million. On the other hand, the percentage of obese women in rural areas reaches stunning 47.2%.

The numbers for men are showing a similar pattern: 31.8% in large cities, 42.4 percent in small urban populations and 38.9% in country areas. The numbers for men and women repeat themselves when it comes to male and female children – more obese kids in the country than in the city, basically.

Other Factors

This study attempted to take into account age, race, ethnicity, smoking habits and education level. However, these factors didn’t show much.

Firstly, there was no real difference between white and black men, even though Hispanic men have shown a dramatically higher obesity rate than either of the previous two groups. Unlike this comparison, black women have a higher obesity percentage than white women (55.9% to 38.1%). Hispanic women have about 48% obesity rates, while this number goes down to 13.6% in Asian females.

The last significant factor was education. As it happens, there was no difference between obesity rates in males with a high school education and male college graduates. However, the obesity rates are raised significantly for women as their education levels get lower.

Bottom line, these new statistics are showing that obesity isn’t only more widespread than ever before, but also that it’s becoming a plague in the countryside even more than it is in the cities, despite the fact that city folk are proven to have a more sedentary lifestyle that includes high amounts of junk food.


About the author:

Stefan is a writer and a blogger in his spare time. He also works for First Beat Media, a company that mainly focuses on the online dating niche and similar services.