
America has become a place where being overweight is more common than being at a healthy and normal weight. 69% of American's are overweight or obese, 20% of children are overweight (Fed Up). These statistics are unacceptable and need to be changed. American's need to put their health before their taste buds and become educated on what food their body needs. Diets are not sustainable and are more likely to cause weight gain in the long run (Aamodt). The paleo diet nor counting calories is the cure for America's obesity epidemic. America needs a lifestyle change that is sustainable. As a result of poor nutrition education that has been influenced by industry no one really knows what is healthy. Are carbohydrates good or bad? How much protein do humans need to consume per day? Is milk actually good for you? How much and what kind of exercise should you exercise to lose weight and maintain a healthy weight?  Through exploring how the human body processes food it becomes clear that the solution to America's obesity epidemic is to switch to a whole food plant based diet while incorporating moderate amounts of exercise into one's lifestyle. 

Outline 

Main Points 

Discuss the epidemic 

Statistics in adults and children 

There are three factors in weight: diet, exercise, and genes. 

BMI definition (Daniels) 

1 in 5 children are overweight (Fed Up)

In 2015 more people will die from the effects of being overweight than die of starvation (Fed Up)

Between 1980 and 200 obesity rates have doubled (Fed Up)

Side effects of being obese

Hospitals have had to buy special wheelchairs, operating tables, and larger revolving doors to accommodate obese patients (Kolbert) 

Discuss the causes 

Standard American Diet 

Discuss increase in recommended dairy intake and why Harvard School of Public Health and Pennsylvania State of Public Health disagree 

Compare USDA "My Plate" to what the Harvard School of Public Health recommends 

Lack of exercise 

Increase in TV, video games 

Easiness of medications 

"you are looking to modern medicine for a solution. Stop looking. They are not going to cure dietary diseases with a pill or a surgery. You are going to fix dietary diseases by fixing the problem. Which is, the food. When you fix the food what happens is people get healthy. You as individuals sick with various diseases, communities, countries, and the world can get healthy by making a simple change back to a starch based diet." (McDougall) 

Fast food 

Everyone knows it's bad but how do we stop eating it 

Lack of education 

How industry influences the recommendations for what American's should eat when it should be doctors and scientists 

Discuss the solution 

Obesity is not a condition that can be fixed in a few weeks or even a few months, and you should beware of diets, portions and pills that create rapid weight loss with no promise of good health in the future. 

The diet that helps to reduce weight in the short run needs to be the same diet that creates and maintains health in the long run" The China Study 143 

Give up on the idea that obesity is genetic 

The purpose behind the obesity gene search is to allow researchers to develop a drug capable of knocking out or inactivating the underlying cause of obesity. This is extremely shortsighted, as well as unproductive. Believing that specific identifiable genes are the basis of obesity (i.e., it's in the family) also allows us to fatalistically blame a cause that we cannot control. We can control the cause. It is right at the end of our fork" The China Study 144

Cut out dairy 

How it is processed (artificial insemination etc.)

We are the only species to drink another species milk 

Cow's milk by design, grows a 90 lb calf into a 2000 lb cow over the course of two years.  -- Rory Freedman

Mammals need the enzyme lactase to digest lactose 

Between the ages of 18 months and 4 years we lose 90 to 95% of this enzyme 

Undigested lactose and the acidic nature of pasteurized milk encourage the growth of bacteria in our intestines. This bacteria contributes to a grater risk of cancer because cancer cells thrive in acidic environments

Cut out meat 

"Carnivores have a capacious simple, single-chambered, stomach. The stomach volume of a carnivore represents 60-70% of the total capacity of the digestive system. Because meat is relatively easily digested, their small intestines (where absorption of food molecules takes place) are short and about three to five or six times the body length. Since these animals average a kill only about once a week, a large stomach volume is advantageous because it allows the animals to quickly gorge themselves when eating, taking in s much meat as possible at one time which can be digested later while resting. Additionally, the ability of the carnivore stomach to secrete hydrochloric acid is exceptional. Carnivores are able to keep their gastric pH down around 1-2 even with food present. This is necessary to facilitate protein breakdown and to kill the abundant dangerous bacteria often found in decaying flesh foods." The Comparative Anatomy of Eating 

"Carnivores have short intestinal tracts and colons that allow meat to pass through the animal relatively quickly, before it can rot and cause illness. Humans' intestinal tracts are much longer than those of carnivores of comparable size. Longer intestines allow the body more time to break down fiber and absorb the nutrients from plant-based foods, but they make it dangerous for humans to eat meat. The bacteria in meat have extra time to multiply during the long trip through the digestive system, increasing the risk of food poisoning. Meat actually begins to rot while it makes its way through human intestines, which increases the risk of colon cancer." Peta The Natural Human Diet 

"Meat, poultry, fish, seafood, cheese, milk, and eggs, are widely considered an appropriate, even essential part of a healthy diet." The Starch Solution 

Animal foods are made up of large amounts of protein, fat, and cholesterol, with high levels of the sulfur-containing amino acid methionine and dietary acids." The Starch Solution 39

High carb low fat 

"The solution to losing weight is a whole food, plant-based diet, coupled with a reasonable amount of exercise. It is a long-term lifestyle change, rather than a quick fix fad, and it can provide sustained weight loss while minimizing risk of chronic disease." The China Study

"At the Pritikin Center, 4,500 patients who had gone through their three-week program got similar results. By feeding a mostly plant-based diet and promoting exercise, the Center found that its clients lost 5.5% of their body weight over three weeks." The China Study 

"Published results for still more intervention studies using a low-fat, whole food, mostly plant based diet: 

About two to five pounds lost after twelve days 

About ten pounds lost in three weeks 

Sixteen pounds lost over twelve weeks 

Twenty-four pounds lost after one year (the China Study)

Keeping body weight off is a long-term lifestyle choice" The china Study 

"Gimmicks that produce impressively large, quick weight losses don't work in the long term. Short-term gains should not come along with long-term pain, and other problems that may be brought on with popular diet fads. If the weight was gained slowly, over a period of months and years, why would you expect to take it off healthily in a matter of weeks? Treating weight loss as a race doesn't work; it only makes the dieter more eager to quit the diet and go back to eating habits that put them in need of losing weight in the first place." The China Study 

Throw away ideas about counting calories. Generally speaking you can eat as you want and still lose weight  --  as long as you eat the right type of food. Stop expecting sacrifice, deprivation or blandness; there's no need. Feeling hungry is a sign that something is wrong, and prolonged hunger causes your body to slow the overall rate of metabolism in defense." The China Study 

"It is a worry-free way to eat. Give your body the right food and it will do the right thing." The China Study 141 

Whole foods are nutrient dense and low in caloric density 

"The China Study demonstrated that rural Chinese consuming a plant-based diet actually consume significantly more calories per pound of body weight than Americans. Most people would automatically assume that these rural Chinese would therefore be heavier than their meat-eating counterparts. But here's the kicker: the rural Chinese are still slimmer while consuming a greater volume of food and more calories." Some would argue that this is due to the Chinese having greater physical activity but this comparison is between the average American and the least active Chinese, those who do office work" The China Study 141,142

Vegetarians have been observed to have a slightly higher rate of metabolism during rest, meaning they burn up slightly more of their ingested calories as body heat rather than depositing them as body fat. A relatively small increase in metabolic rate translates to a large number of calories burned over the course of twenty-four hours. Most of the scientific basis for the importance of this phenomenon was presented in chapter four." The China Study 142

Exercise 

Build an exercise program into your lifestyle "so that you will become and continue to be more fit over all, not just burn off calories." The China Study 142 

Diet and exercise work together to decrease body weight and improve overall health" The China Study 143 

Weight lifting vs cardio 

Minimum exercise needed for a healthy lifestyle 

Fifteen to forty-five minutes, per day, every day, will maintain a body weight that is eleven to eighteen pounds lighter than it would otherwise be" The China Study 142 

Why should you try to get your heart rate up during exercise? 

Discuss fat burning zone 

Discuss what the solution is not 

Why the whole food plant based diet didn't work for some patients 

" ... losing body weight on a plant-based diet is much less likely to occur if the diet includes too many refined carbohydrates. Sweets, pastries and pastas won't do it. These foods are high in readily digested sugars and starches and, for pastries, oftentimes very high in fat as well." The China Study

The second reason weight loss may be elusive is if a person never engages in any physical activity. A reasonable amount of physical activity sustained on a regular basis, can pay important dividends." The China Study 

"Thirdly, certain people have a family predisposition for overweight bodies that may make their challenge more difficult." For these people they "need to be especially rigorous in their diet and exercise" The China Study

Why the Atkins/Paleo diet isn't the solution 

Eating large amounts of meat puts your body into a state of ketosis 

Why "everything in moderation" is not a thing 

We need to make big changes to prevent having big people 

Conclusion 

"not for everyone" needs to be for everyone 

High carb low fat  --  easy to implement 

More exercise less tv time 

