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Ronnie Holcomb
Charley Bevill
ENGL 1301-03
12 March 2016
Report On the Relationship of Fast Food and Obesity
Obesity has been a serious problem in The United States for decades, and one of the
major contributing factors of such a high rate of obesity is the increased consumption of fast
food. Obesity and being over-weight is a health concern that should not be neglected. Even
though obesity rates have not been growing as fast as they have in the past, it is still a significant
issue that has to do with the general health of the country.
Someone that is obese is someone who has a body mass index (BMI) of 30 or greater.
BMI is not a perfect way to determine whether or not someone is un-healthily over weight, but it
is currently the metric the government of The United States uses to evaluate obesity.
Being overweight and obese is not just an innocuous choice of life style. According to the
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) some examples of health effects associated
with obesity are all causes of death (mortality), type 2 diabetes, coronary heart disease, stroke,
gallbladder disease, osteoarthritis (A breakdown of cartilage and bone within a joint), generally
low quality of life, some types of cancer, mental illness such as clinical depression, body pain,
and difficulty with physical functions.
Americans are consuming an astonishing amount of fast food, and significant portion of
the population is obese. Obesity has only been a problem for the US for a couple of decades, ever
since McDonalds, the biggest fast food chain, filed for its first trademark in 1961, obesity and
fast food consumption have both seen significant growth. On TheAtlantics website, there is an

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animated map that tracks the CDCs official data of rates of obesity from 1985 to 2010. The map
shows that the percent of the population that is obese tripled from 1990 to 2010 in many southern
states. Jumping from 10% to 30% in Texas. Childhood obesity has more than doubled in children
and quadrupled in adolescence. This correlates with the boom of the fast food industry.
According to Eric Schollser, in his book Fast Food Nation, Americans spend one hundred ten
billion dollars on fast food per year. That is up from six billion in 1970.
Children are more vulnerable to the dangers of fast food. Children and young adults do
not have a fully developed brain, so un-healthy habits they form in adolescence are very difficult
to break even when they become adults. According to the CDC, obese youth are more likely to
have risk factors for cardiovascular disease, such as high cholesterol or high blood pressure. In a
population- based sample of 5- to 17-year-olds, 70% of obese youth had at least one risk factor
for cardiovascular disease. These are not just short term problems either, the CDC also says that
Children and adolescents who are obese are likely to be obese as adults and are therefore more at
risk for adult health problems such as heart disease, type 2 diabetes, stroke, several types of
cancer, and osteoarthritis. One study showed that children who became obese as early as age 2
were more likely to be obese as adults. In his article 29 Important Mcdonalds Obesity statistics,
Brandon Gaille says that 70% of the kids who grow up in the obese category will remain obese
as adults.
Another example of the dangers of fast food is that people can become physically
addicted in a similar way to drug addictions. High-calorie and high-fat foods, such as many of
the items you will find in a fast food restaurant, affect the brain in much of the same way as
cocaine does. Doing drugs such as cocaine and eating too much junk food both gradually
overload the so-called pleasure centers in the brain, according to Paul J. Kenny, Ph.D., an

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associate professor of molecular therapeutics at the Scripps Research Institute, in Jupiter, Florida.
Eventually the pleasure centers crash, and achieving the same amount of pleasure--or even just
feeling normal--requires increasing amounts of the drug or food, says Kenny, the lead author of
the study. Reports Sarah Klein, writer at the health section of CNNs website.

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Works Cited
The Health Risks of Overweight and Obesity
cdc.gov 05 June 2015
Childhood Obesity Facts
cdc.gov 27 August 2015
Gaille, Brandon. 29 Important Mcdonalds Obesity Statistics
Brandongaille.com 01 November 2014
Hablin, James. Look How Quickly the U.S. Got Fat (1985-2010)
Theatlantic.com 11 April 2013
Klein, Sarah. Fatty Food May Cause Cocaine Like Addiction
CNN.com 30 March 2010