From Your Health Journal…..A very good article by FOX News via Reuters entitled Despite Obesity Rise, US Calories Trending Downward. This is an interesting article, as it points to the fact the US food/calorie consumption is down, but obesity rates are increasing. It almost seems to contradict itself. A recent study determined found that among adults, average daily energy intake rose by a total of 314 calories from 1971 to 2003, then fell by 74 calories between 2003 and 2010. The bottom line, it is very important to continue to watch what you eat, making healthy choices, and reducing portion sizes to maintain a healthy balance. Add to this daily physical activity, adequate sleep, and proper hydration, and some positive change can occur for most. Please visit the FOX News web site (link provided below) to read the complete article. It was well written, educational, and informative.”

From the article…..

U.S. adults have been eating steadily fewer calories for almost a decade, despite the continued increase in obesity rates, according to survey data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

“It’s hard to reconcile what these data show, and what is happening with the prevalence of obesity,” co-author Dr. William Dietz, former CDC director of Nutrition, Physical Activity and Obesity, told Reuters Health.

The results, published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, are based on the nine National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys (NHANES) the CDC has conducted between 1971 and 2010. Several thousand adults aged 20 to 74 were randomly selected every two to four years and asked to recall what they ate over the previous 24 hours.

Dietz and a colleague analyzed trends since the 1970s and found that among adults, average daily energy intake rose by a total of 314 calories from 1971 to 2003, then fell by 74 calories between 2003 and 2010.

“Seventy-four calories is a lot, and as I said before, we would expect to see a measurable impact on obesity,” said Dietz.

Nevertheless, about 35 percent of U.S. adult women are obese, and that percentage has held steady since 1999, according to the CDC. For men, obesity has risen from 27 percent to 35 percent over the same time period.

Dietz said he would have expected obesity rates to have leveled-off for both sexes and to be decreasing at this point, if people are consuming fewer calories.

The CDC released similar results last month for children: boys have cut their calorie intake by 150, and girls by 80, since 1999. Obesity rates for boys continue to increase, however, while holding steady for girls.

Experts said it’s possible more time is needed to see obesity rates respond to changes in calorie intake. It’s also possible that Americans have changed their eating habits but are still not getting enough exercise to burn the calories they do consume. Or, the surveys may simply be wrong.

To read the full article…..Click here