Here in the United States, far too many people are not leading the healthy lives that they should be. Our average lifestyle has taken a turn for the drastically unhealthy in many cases, with less than 3% of all adults in this country actually living in a healthful way. It will come as no surprise then, to hear that only about one third of the adult population is currently considered to be at a healthy weight. In fact, one third of the population is obese, sometimes morbidly so, while the other remaining one third is classified as overweight.
Being obese and overweight can certainly have severe ramifications on just about anyone’s health, particularly as time passes on and the weight is not dealt with. For instance, it is not uncommon to see overweight and especially obese people develop cases of Type 2 diabetes. While Type 2 diabetes is treatable and even reversible when drastic changes are made, it can also be dangerous and deadly when it is not properly managed. For many other obese and overweight people, the risk of heart disease, stroke, and heart attack are also very real indeed, and chronic pain problems that are tied to carrying around so much extra weight are certainly not uncommon by any standards of the word.
There are a number of different reasons that obesity has become so problematic here in the United States. While a lack of exercise and physical activity is certainly one of them, the lack of a poor and nutritionally inadequate diet is another main cause that people are unhealthy. Among overweight people and people of a normal weight alike, food consumption has become far from what it should be and far from easy healthy meals. This is also something that can be seen across a wide spectrum of ages as well, ranging from children to adults to the elderly and back again.
Quick meals have become the most sought after eating solution out there, and it is unfortunate, as quick meals found in many restaurant and fast food locations are far from nutritionally adequate. In fact, the research done on this subject shows this quite clearly, as more and more people have been found to be eating quick meals. After all, access to and proximity to a grocery store can make a big difference in how a family or even just a single person eats, and a huge chunk of the population of this country – more than 22 million people throughout it – live more than a mile from all grocery stores in their area. For those who do not have cars or other such motor vehicles, this can make quick meals from fast food locations feel, often, like the only real option that they have.
Thanks to the rise of quick meals, far too few fruits and vegetables are being consumed, even among the adult population. In fact, more than three quarters of all adults (around 80% of them, to be just a little bit more exact) are not eating as many fruits and vegetables as they need to be over the course of each day. And when these people have children, it is far too likely that their children are falling into the same bad eating habits. To compound this problem, we are also consuming too much of the things that are bad for us as well, as quick meals all throughout the country often have high concentrations of such ingredients.
Again, this can be seen in recently gathered data. Often through the consumption of quick meals, many Americans are consuming more sodium than they need, a population that currently makes up as much as 90% of all adults living here in this country. And while sodium is certainly a must have in any healthy diet, too much of it is just as bad – if not worse – as having too little. Therefore, it will be important for us to understand exactly what is in the quick meals that we are purchasing – and what we must do to limit our sodium intake, even when eating easy dinners and prepared meals instead of healthy food recipes.