America's Future

[Adam R Wende]

I'm glad this thread has taken off. The problem is everyone here isn't the problem I wish we could get the average American as worked up about this.
Here is another log on the fire that someone just sent me today: http://www.ksl.com/?nid=201&sid=16345272

[April G]

Another view:
http://www.thehandthatfeedsus.org/farming_america_Bad-Advice-for-a-High-Price.cfm

[Adam R Wende]

April, That is interesting I wonder about the contribution of the exploding population?

[Paul Petersen]

Thankfully the world is ending in 2012, so we don't have to worry about how we are otherwise doomed due to exploding population, dwindling food, water, & energy supply, debt, global warming, measles, and shrinking bumblebee populations.

[April G]

And the default, you forgot the default, August 2nd.

[Sasha Pachev]

Adam:

Very interesting research. I remember we discussed it during the relay in Arizona in 2008 and it immediately made sense to me. Just as soil conditions affect the quality of the plants, you would expect the womb conditions to affect the health of the child just as much if not more. The child does everything with his mother for the entire duration of the pregnancy. They are connected with a cord until the time of delivery.  How could you possibly expect that a mother could be negligent of her health and avoid passing the fallout to the child?

As far as the cause of the decline in health, I think we are dealing with a consequence of our spiritual decline. People who are weak in spirit and mind have no desire to eat healthy or be physically active among other things.

[Erik Stafford]

I know this is a problem in WI.  We live on brats, cheese, and beer!  I'm a Phy.Ed. Teacher and I educate my students to make and think healthy choices.  For the most part between K-5th grades they are active and eat healthy if their parents provide healthy choices for them and give them activities/opportunities.  The school limits portions and I think does an okay job of providing a variety of food choices, but not always the correct portions.  Once the students reach 6th grade they start getting involved in everything under the sun.  Some of my students are in 3-4 sports or activities at any given time.  On top of that they need to find a way to study and get homework done.  Yes, there are some that don't participate in any sports and there always has been.  I think those percentages probably remain close to what they were 20-30 years ago (just a guess).  My observations are that for one we are too busy and it's being instilled in our children that eating properly is an after thought.  This leaves less time to prepare healthy meal choices and runs us down with stress.  When stress or over exertion sets in the first thing we crave is a pick me up like sugar or some salty junk food.  This is caused by skipping meals or being too busy to think about eating and then when we do eat we over eat.  The other part of the equation is the reverse food pyramid.  We are a heavy protein based society (at least WI is) and therefore we eat way more protein than we really need.  Yes, protein diets can help lose weight, but only if you're eating lean proteins and avoiding the junk food and carbs.  The meat portions are too large and the vegetable portions are too large.  If our schools and restaurants promoted a more plant based diet and reversed the portions of vegetables to meat I believe we'd see fewer problems with obesity.  The other problem is that almost everything has become processed to help us live our busy lives.  We rely too much on processed foods even when we think they may be healthy or certain foods appear to be healthy they really aren't.  I have no factual data that suggests processed food choices are increasing, but I do believe they are cheaper than organic for the most part.  Finally, very few of these very busy people are burning enough calories to burn the high amounts of sugar and fatty proteins.  This is all a result of people working longer hours to make ends meet.  People over exerting themselves in activities because we want more hurts our health among other things. 

[Adam R Wende]

Erik,
I agree WI is a special case (my dad lives there and I spent a number of summers there). With that being said I think the brats, cheese and way too much beer (biggest parties in my life there) and dare I say too much time sitting and watching a Green Bay game instead of tossing the pigskin in the backyard are to blame. The stress issue I think is only a part of the problem and centers more around socioeconomic circles. As a scientist and working with a number of clinicians we are very guilty of overexerting ourselves. I do not know a person who is successful in my career path that does not work at least a few 80+ hour weeks each year (a few that work 100+). However, we are also some of the thinnest people and none of the people I work with need bells and whistles for their activities. The majority of my peers do still find time for either running or cycling and the simpler the better. You raise some interesting points but I still think TV, soda (other calorie dense foods), lack of activity, etc. have more to do with it than just our work ethic. I agree with Sasha in a way that most people just don't care enough. Their lack of spirit per se sends them down the path of least resistance. So overall I think we are on similar pages I just think more finger pointing needs to be put on personal responsibility than blaming stress.

Sasha,
I do want to point out that it is not just the mothers to blame. There are a number of studies out there now to show that marks put on the father's DNA prior to fertilization also influence the offspring's ability to adapt to "extreme" diets. Though obviously the mother has a lot more influence so you got the main focus. This higher hurdle per generation is one of the main reasons I think there has been such a drastic acceleration in the raise of obesity, diabetes and other chronic diseases.