Well, it appears to be official:  Obesity has edged out smoking in terms of health hazards.  According to a study performed by Columbia University and the City College of New York and published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, being obese, defined by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) as having a Body Mass Index or BMI of 30 or more (not hard to achieve in today’s fast-food oriented society), significantly increases your chances of having a declining quality of life the longer you remain so.

The study found that “obesity had a larger effect on disease, while smoking had a greater impact on deaths.” Translation?  Being obese leaves you wide open to a large number of diseases such as heart disease, liver disease, diabetes, kidney disease, degenerative joint diseases, and on and on.  Smoking, on the other hand, tends to lead to a narrower group of diseases, mainly forms of cancer.

The bottom line is that your future quality of life, your ability to move around and do what you want, will be (not “can be” but “will be”) significantly reduced if you’re obese or if you’re a smoker.  God help if you’re both because you’ve got a “double whammy” working against you.

From 1993 to 2008, the study noted, the number of adult smokers in America DEcreased 18.5%, thanks to the many anti-smoking campaigns and quit-smoking programs and treatments that have been implemented over that same time period.  However, the proportion of Americans in the obese category over the same number of years INcreased by 85%!  That’s a huge (no pun intended) increase.

You want to know why healthcare in this country is so expensive? There’s a big part of it right there – the treatment of obesity-related diseases.  Remember the study conclusion that “obesity had a larger effect on disease?”  This tells you that obesity-related diseases tend to put you in the hospital for much longer periods of time and the treatments are much longer in duration.

But even if you forget the cost to our healthcare system (such as it is) to being treated for weight-related Type 2 diabetes, for example, for the rest of your life, imagine what that does to your lifestyle.  Imagine what having to go for treatments or having to take injections every couple of days does to your ability to enjoy life.

I watched my late uncle’s weight-related diabetes destroy his kidneys, and eventually take his life, but not before doctors had to amputate his feet and he had to undergo dialysis every 3 days.  His life had very little “quality” at the end.

By the way, according to the US Center for Disease Control (CDC):

The estimated economic cost of diabetes in 2007 was $174 billion. Of this amount, $116 billion was due to direct medical costs and $58 billion due to indirect costs such as lost workdays, restricted activity, and disability due to diabetes. People with diagnosed diabetes incur average expenditures of $11,744 per year, of which $6,649 is attributed to diabetes. People with diagnosed diabetes, on average, have medical expenditures that are approximately 2.3 times higher than what expenditures would be in the absence of diabetes. Approximately $1 of  $5 health care dollars in the United States is spent caring for someone with diagnosed diabetes, while approximately $1 of $10 health care dollars is attributed to diabetes.

It’s been estimated that obesity can easily shorten your expected life span by 9 months or more.  That’s almost an entire year.  But that’s just your “expected life span.”  Being obese can reduce your quality of life to a point that living longer doesn’t seem like a good idea anyway.

Did you get that last sentence?  Did it sink in?  Being overweight can make you so disease-ridden that you don’t care whether you live any longer or not.  How sad is that?  Can you imagine what that does to your loved ones?

Well, here’s the good part.  The good news is that you can change all of that.  If you smoke, you can quit.  If you’re obese, you can lose the weight.  It won’t be easy and it won’t be quick but you can do it.  All you have to do in order to start is to decide you need to change, and then take each day an hour at a time.

The improved quality of life you receive will be well worth the effort.  You’ll not only benefit yourself, think of how it will affect your entire family.  They’ll see you improving and they’ll want to improve as well.  You’ll all end up supporting each other, step by step.

Take the first step right now.  Decide to change your life.  It will be the best decision you make.

Certified Fitness Nutrition Coach and
Personal Fitness Trainer (NESTA)

P.S.  Be sure to get my latest Fitness Blueprint called “Little Things That Improve Your Health.”  This ebook is packed with loads of helpful information on how to build a better body and you can get it FREE – for a limited time.  Just click on the title to be taken to the download page.  Enjoy!

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