About 48 per cent of Canadian adults are overweight - and Saskatoon is fat city, according to Statistics Canada figures from 2003.The Saskatchewan city had the country's highest percentage of obese residents at 18.2 per cent, with 50.3 per cent considered overweight. No. 2 on the chubby chart was Halifax, where 17.9 per cent were classed as obese and 51.6 as overweight. At the other end of the scale, 6.1 per cent of Vancouver citizens were obese and 30.1 per cent were overweight. The West Coast centre not coincidentally also had the distinction of being the city with the most fit and active residents in the country.
They also have the distinction of being relatively young, with higher incomes compared to Saskatchewan residents.
Not mentioned is that there are vastly different age, income and racial distributions in regions across the country.
In addition to the weighty consequences of an aging population, Saskatoon has a higher percentage of First Nations people than any other "major" city in Canada. (First Nations make up over 17% of the total population of the province) Genetic predisposition among aboriginal peoples places them at high risk of diabetes/obesity. (The same patterns occur, for the same reasons, in African-Americans in the US). As indelicate as it is to say so, North America is the only continent on the planet where poor people are fat. With chronic poverty and unemployment, the problem of rising obesity rates in this province is unlikely to be solved by providing tax deductions for gym memberships.
40 lbs gone, 40 lbs to go... It's finally warm enough outside to go for walks again and that will help. Now all I need is for my sciatica to settle down so that I'm not in agony when I try to walk. :-(
Damned sciatica ... I'll keep that excuse handy next time I go up by 5...
It never used to bother me until the day that a newly-hired prep cook turned the on the gas oven at the stove by my workstation mistakenly assuming that it would light automatically. It didn't, and it blew just as I was walking past. The door blew off and put me partway through a wall. I haven't worked a day as a chef since.
My back seems to range between painful and excruciatingly painful now (I sometimes need a cane to walk). I figure I'm doing pretty good for someone who was supposed to be using a wheelchair.
So, yeah, that's why I don't exercise as much as I should.
Can we conclude that welfare makes you fat, ans thus is a dangereous to one's health?
"Times have changed/and now the poor get fat..."
Imagine: Sir Elton John, seeing the future so clearly back in 1974...
woo hoo. Growing up as a white male I knew I was a member of some minority group! Thank you for point out which one.
Sean I have sciatica and it is caused by a herniated disc in my back. But it took me four months to get an MRI, will take maybe a year to see a specialist and who knows how long after that for an operation. My suggestion is go to a physiotherapist who can give you some simple exercises that really help.
Anyone notice the sentence in the article "People in [city] have lower obesity rates because they are less overweight" (or something close to that, at any rate)?
Missed the person's title. Doctor of Tautology, perhaps?