Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2016

Publication Title

ACSM's Health & Fitness Journal

Volume

20

Abstract

Obesity is an epidemic in the United States. Most health and fitness (H&F) professionals are familiar with reports showing that 69% of American adults are overweight, and an estimated 36.5%are obese, defined as having a body mass index (BMI) of 25 kg/m2 or higher and 30 kg/m2 or higher, respectively. Thus, 78.6 million American adults are considered to have excess weight that is detrimental to their health (16,17,19). In 2014, there was not a single state with a prevalence of obesity of less than 20%, and 19 states were reported to have an obesity prevalence of more than 30%. This is a remarkable change since 1990, when the prevalence of obesity was only 12%, and no state had an obesity prevalence of more than 15% (6). Obesity raises the risk of early mortality and other chronic diseases and is associated with increased health care costs, placing a large financial burden on the United States.

Issue

4

First Page

15

Last Page

20

DOI

10.1249/FIT.0000000000000217

ISSN

1091-5397

Comments

Originally published in ACSM's Health & Fitness Journal: July/August 2016 - Volume 20 - Issue 4 - p 15–20 doi: 10.1249/FIT.0000000000000217

https://journals.lww.com/acsm-healthfitness/Fulltext/2016/07000/THE_BENEFITS_OF_BODY_MASS_INDEX_AND_WAIST.8.aspx

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