Number of overweight teens in England has soared by 50% since 2008
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/overweight-teens-england-increased-b2731608.html
by tylerthe-theatre
Number of overweight teens in England has soared by 50% since 2008
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/overweight-teens-england-increased-b2731608.html
by tylerthe-theatre
42 comments
The amount of misinformation around obesity and weight loss is a big thing
This thread will be full of people arguing that eating less doesn’t always work, or that it’s all carbs fault, or any number of other myths
Schools need to introduce no bullshit no myths lessons on weight loss.
Who’d have thought that increasing the accessibility, availability and the sheer volume of fast food, specifically american fast food restaraunts also added on with more static and sedentary forms of recreation and entertainment such as endless amounts of streaming platforms, games etc would lead to increased obesity
Add that on to a lot of brits poor knowledge when it comes to food and it was always gonna happen
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Kids at son’s school cannot run. Clearly have never run before in their lives. Confused how to do it. No sport in their lives. What do parents do with their kids now a days? Maybe cultural reasons?
Selling off the school playing fields will do that.
Unacceptable. Completely unacceptable.
We need to bring shaming back. Now.
No shit.. is anyone going out to play sports or do they just sit in front of Tik tok and play video games ?
How can something soar over 17 years, yes it’s bad that it’s increased that much but whenever anyone tries to do anything about a bunch of people get pissy.
The country is full of starving fatties, who can only afford cheeseburgers and cakes and not a lettuce and a can of tuna
I’d noticed. Kids that would have been statistical outliers, that one kid in the class back when I was at school are now normal.
Anyway, get off my lawn, off to shout at clouds etc.
I read recently an article that the CEO of the Ozempic company in Denmark once received numerous phone calls from senior fast food execs worried that they’re going to be put out of business — being an appetite suppressant and all.
When I joined a sports club at university, I was actually shocked by how normalised a pre (and post) game McDonald’s was. Appreciate we’re absolutely crushing calories here, but you need to burn quality nutrition, not just plasticised meat.
When I was growing up (which I still abide by), fast food was a treat. Once a month at best, or at the airport before a flight or something. But I know people who Deliveroo this stuff 2 or 3 times a week!
I think people have lost the ability to cook for themselves, tbh. Thank god my parents could cook; seems like an idiosyncratic class barrier sometimes.
*Edit: Spalling*
That’s what we get when all we eat is fast food and sweets.
As a parent, one thing I’ve noticed is that there’s a real reluctance to be seen as ‘judging’ parents for the decisions they make. There’s definitely room for nuance, I don’t know a single person who follows guidelines to the letter, and it’s pretty well known that guidelines are unnecessarily restrictive. However, if you’re sitting at play group and someone starts talking about how their child is basically raised by Cocomelon and the only way to get them to eat is to give them cake and chips, the social contract is for you to nod and smile and confirm that it’s so hard to be a parent you just do what you have to do, and it’s *mean* to suggest that isn’t very good for the child.
This culture of unconditional validation prevents important conversations about real concerns. The irony is, these same parents who nod sympathetically to your face will likely criticize these practices behind your back. So we’ve created this strange situation where genuinely problematic parenting goes unchallenged and even justified as just doing what’s necessary, all in the name of ‘support and acceptance’ – when what we really need is a balance between supporting parents and being honest about practices that might actually harm children.
Wow who knew that taking away the playing field and putting a KFC on it would be bad news
Calories in calories out.
There are some conditions eg thyroid, PCOS that may make losing weight harder but not impossible. That’s the cards life dealt you. We all have struggles but lots of people these days use medical excuses to remain fat or complain they can’t lose it
Saw a baby with a iPhone in his face the other day in his pram on the train. It wasn’t upset or anything. Mum just couldn’t be bothered I guess.
Was thinking about this the other day after getting commited to eating better and getting healthier. The amount of calories in fast foods and ready meals and restuarants is just crazy. It’s making people fat and unhealthy. Like I need to eat half a portion of any of those to stay on track but who would do that? You come across like a weirdo. Kudos to places like Cote that have calories on the menu. All I could get was salad and not break the food bank! 1000 calorie meals all over the place. Add chips is like +700 more! The salad I ordered came with chips! I turned it down.
Hardly surprising. It’s hard to combat this issue, though.
Calorie dense foods are cheaper and more readily accessible, and a lot of folks don’t have the time or energy to spend on making nutritious foods. Unhealthy, ready-made is much faster and less draining. I cook food from scratch fairly often, and I’m always surprised how big of a chunk of my time is spent on just doing that. With how little free time people have after school and work, I don’t blame them for feeling like they can’t always be bothered to do all that labour every single day.
Never mind the fact that a lot of our socialising nowadays happens online, even for teens. There’s hardly any spaces where kids feel welcome, everything is more expensive, and there’s few spaces where people can hang out and socialise for free. So there’s generally less exercise in the day-to-day.
We can cry all we want about the lack of sports in schools. But even outside of school there’s not much incentive for kids to move around.
When I was a teenager my friends and I would hang out outside a lot, but the only space to feasibly do that was children’s playgrounds since every other public space came with the expectation to shill out money one way or another, or required to pay a bus fare to get to that we couldn’t afford on a regular basis since public transport in the UK is expensive. We *wanted* to have places to just have fun, to meet other kids our age, but those places just didn’t exist for us.
I also feel that people in the UK tend to be very wary of strangers. Making new friends is pretty tough in environments without alcohol involved. When other teens approach, it’s often seen with a suspicious lens since some are out there to mess with people, or steal their stuff. The public spaces that are fairly available often don’t feel super safe because of that bull.
Sure, “you can’t outrun a bad diet”, but if we walk a lot in our day to day it can help burn off quite a lot of that energy. I don’t necessarily mean deliberately taking an hour of an already busy day to walk 10k steps, but the mundane tasks of getting from point A to B without thinking much about it. Japan can be a decent example, as the people there walk quite a lot even for commutes.
First time in history the poor kids are fatter than the rich ones.
The kids aren’t exercising and fast food is way too accessible now.
Also too many people too focused on trying to undo the damage that their parents did that they’re over correcting and not parenting at all.
I’m sure the majority of this is an increase in fatness. I do want to know how much is an increase in sports and gym culture though. It has become much more socially acceptable (and desirable) for males and females to get into sports and lifting, including bulking up and putting on size overall. That would shift averages pretty considerably if we’re only using BMI. I know it won’t be the majority, but I would love to see that data anyway.
Significantly increased fast food availability (deliveries and more stores)
Poor food quality at the cheap end with many now priced out of decent quality healthy options
iPad kids
Shocked to the core !
On the bright side this might mean fewer gr**ming g*ng scandals down the line.
I know its more than this, but every kid I see at a cafe with its mum, 9 out of 10 they’re on a phone. My cousins don’t give their kids phones, oldest is 9 has about 2 hrs of phone time max a day. All 4 kids are athletic. Parents should not use phones as pacifiers. And start them that young
Exercise 4 times per week
Eat healthy and in moderation
Stay under calorie goals
——-
It’s actually that simple
That’s because 90% of what’s sold wasn’t Evan considered food 50 years ago.
Because the woke have said that obesity is all genetics and it’s perfectly fine to be “plus sized”
Video games existed over 20 years ago. In fact over 30 years ago. Not sure why they’re being blamed. It’s moreso social media that the issue.
every town has like 20 take aways, tf else would we expect?
When parents are overworked the children are always going to be neglected and penned in like farm animals.
We need 4 day work-week, significantly higher wages, and this will not be an issue any more. Sports are not as popular any more, and the children are not allowed to do anything so they turn to video games. Only at 25 have I actually been able to unlearn the restrictions put on me, and start doing things in the real world, because nobody is really recognising this issue.
Everyone who blames this on bad parenting, are probably not parents, or never had a parent who tried their best. You recognise as you get older they literally do not have anything left for you by the time they get home.
And no, as the 30, 40, 50 year old Redditor you have no clue how doomed these kids are and how little they have to look forward to. A lot of the comments here, are so judgemental, and we have seen time and time again judgemental attiudes are completely unhelpful and do not fix anything, I wish infinite shame on people who think hating fat people will stop them being fat.
Surprised at this, teenagers I see these days seem in much better shape than when I was a teen (00s)
Poverty has risen, during this period.
Crap filling food is cheap.
# 86% of Teens Exposed to Junk Food Ads on Social Media86% of Teens Exposed to Junk Food Ads on Social Media.
[https://news.cancerresearchuk.org/2020/12/18/86-of-teens-exposed-to-junk-food-ads-on-social-media/](https://news.cancerresearchuk.org/2020/12/18/86-of-teens-exposed-to-junk-food-ads-on-social-media/)
So reducing portion sizes and introducing the sugar tax didn’t work? Whoda thunk it.
Take all the artificial shite out of fizzy drinks and bring back the sugar please.
There are people that believe switching to certain foods will help you lose weight. I hear people say “Cut out sugar for fats” which completely ignores that to lose weight, you need to eat less calories.
Carbs, sugar, fats, doesn’t really matter. The simple rule is, of you consume less calories than you burn, you lose weight.
I’ve been to a Harry Styles concert and the amount of obesity shocked me.
Looks like Jamie fucking Oliver ruined our soft drinks and cordials for no fucking reason. Absolute twat.
It’s the Monster, chips, chicken nuggets and an absolute lack of any sort of exercise whatsoever.
The number of them who just don’t eat any vegetables “bcoz ew” is actually frightening.
It’s the Monster that gets me. The young people I work with are routinely chugging 3 or 4 cans of the stuff a day, and complaining when they have headaches and don’t sleep.
And when you point out the obvious, they look at you like you’re 86 and don’t know what you’re talking about.
A show called Secret Eaters is pretty awesome. I found it really educational!
Bunch of people saying they don’t know why they gain weight. So they get observed for a week and shows their calorie intake. Always extremely high.
The one time someone lost weight after a week of observation. They ‘cheated’ by intentionally not eating what they would normally eat stating they were ill. So they consumed less calories and lost weight.
It’s a really informative show that show that also dives into things like what color your plate is might help you lose weight. Simply by trying to highlight how much food you have on your plate and trying to portion correctly. Dark plates you may add more food on. White plate and you can better see how much you are serving yourself. Makes sense to a degree. All the little things add up into how much you consume.
Nearly 2/3 rds of adults in the UK are overweight/obese.
It runs in families.
My two are athletic like me…
Gonna lob in a major factor often not mentioned in these discussions: sleep. Much easier to control calorie consumption as well as engage in physical activity with decent sleep (I’m speaking mentally but to an extent physically too). However, our entire culture seems set up to make good, restful sleep challenging for many people whether that is due to screens, work and money concerns, the shocking state of childcare especially at the infant and toddler stage, or just literal outside noise.
100+ years ago most people were active majority of their day, their chores/walking everywhere likely kept people slim, as well as lack of food choices… the activity levels of most people today is a lot lower. Also, having good muscle mass can help burn calories in the body even when sitting around. But with lack of activity, excess calories, lower muscle mass = increased risk of obesity. We as a population have gotten extremely lazy in most aspects of our lives.
Technology plays a big part in obesity too, gaming, robot vacuums, supermarket deliveries etc thus reducing movement.
I have also noticed it’s cheaper to buy “multipacks” of crisps/chocolate/sweets rather than a standard portion size packet, people are more likely to eat more than one portion out of a multi pack, increasing calorie intake.
And everyone is obsessed these days with sauces like garlic mayo, taco sauce, southwest mayonnaise, I remember as a child none of these existed and now teenagers/children need to layer their chips or whatnot with these sauces. Full of oils and very high calorie content!
It’s normal to be slightly hungry when in a calorie deficit as an attempt to lose weight, that’s an easy signal to let you know you’ve ate below your usual calorie intake, but if you are absolutely STARVING, tummy rumbling, eat something high in protein like a protein yogurt and a tiny bit of nuts. A lot of people these days just want quick fixes and have no patience to stick out a little hunger.
Just my two cents here but there’s ALOT to tackle here at a population level 🫣
Solely down to education on what good we should be eating.
I’m overweight but that’s due to alcohol intake, I’d never feed my son constant unhealthy meals.
Why are you feeding your children chicken nuggets 4 times a week / Richmond sausages???
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