Causes of Obesity

Obesity is one of the most common diseases in the world. Currently, more than one third of adults (35.7%) in the United States are obese. This statistic means that in the long run, people will have high chances of getting a serious disease, such as heart disease, stroke, and diabetes. There are many reasons leading to obesity, such as consuming a lot of fast food due to busy lifestyles, genetics combined with bad eating habits, and emotional overindulging.  Therefore, it is important to make people aware of the bad habits that can lead to obesity.

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    Because life can be busy for many people, instead of following healthy diets every day, their first, quick and easy choice is to eat fast food. Most people are aware of how much fatty acids are contained in a regular fast food portion.  However, it is hard to avoid the convenience of fast food, due to people's busy routines and hectic lifestyles. Unfortunately, the poor eating habits of adults tend to influence the food choices of their children. Consequently, fast food is an unhealthy food choice because it tends to include a high number of calories, saturated fats, and carcinogens. All of these ingredients can damage one’s organs. Furthermore, most fast foods are fried in corn oil, which has a lot of fructose, which is a form of sugar. This type of sugar makes consumers want to eat more and more fast food, and this oil also contains trans fats which are as bad for blood cholesterol as saturated fats. Therefore, fast foods do not only make adults and children obese, they also leads to serious future health problems such as high cholesterol and diabetes.

Another leading cause of obesity that many people are not aware of is genetics, combined with poor eating habits. Obesity can pass from one generation to the next, or it can skip generations. With the genes one inherits, combined with a bad-eating routine, a person can be at a high risk for obesity.  Many people with a genetic disposition towards obesity do not realize that it can be the little things that people do everyday, like eating snacks between meals, sitting too long to watch television or a computer that can increase their poor health risk.  Furthermore, being inactive for a long time combined with bad genes can control a person’s shape. Although many people have a normal diet, they can still have a high chance of being obese because of engaging in little to no exercise on a regular basis. Exercising can help a person release a lot of extra energy, which burns fat, but it also helps a person have a good shape and be healthy.

Last, but not least, emotional eating can be a major reason for the high rate of obesity in our society. Emotional eating is when people who are upset and depressed lose control of what they eat. When in one of these states, they tend to eat more on a continuous basis. If a person does not receive help for their depression, they might continuously gain weight as a result. Consequently, the bulk of those extra pounds can be concentrated around their waists, which may lead to poor self-esteem. Because obese people are usually shy and embarrassed whenever they want to contact other people, weight gain can have increased emotional effect. Unfortunately, many people who suffer from emotional eating tend to spend their life isolated, where no one can see and criticize them. With that mindset, they actually decrease their chances of losing weight. In fact, they tend to gain weight uncontrollably.

In conclusion, obesity is an avoidable disease that can lead to serious health problems. It can also cause other diseases, poor health, and low self-esteem. Because fast food, a poor daily diet, and emotional eating habits can lead to obesity, they should be avoided if possible. In order to reduce the risk of obesity, people should eat a healthy diet and exercise everyday, especially if they want to be healthy and have good self-esteem