Health problems in the United States today

In the United States in this, the twenty first century, health problems have become the figurative elephant in the room. Or, if you're considering health problems caused by obesity, they've become the literal elephant in the room. Because the simple fact is that most Americans are overweight, and a significant proportion of Americans are outright obese. And when it comes to modern health problems, few have more far reaching and costly consequences as obesity.

Obesity is insidious in that not only does it kill you, but it kills your pocket book, too. You'll end up spending too much money on too much food that you don't eat. That kind of spending, which occurs across a large swathe of the population, causes overproduction of certain foods and crops, as well as the slashing and burning of forest land to create more grazing land for cattle. This becomes a long-term cost as the climate changes perceptibly, getting warmer since there is less forest land worldwide to absorb the heat of the sun and process greenhouse gases.

It's a systemic, worldwide problem that needs to be fixed. And diet pills aren't the way to do it.

Now, obesity doesn't just cause global health problems. It also causes individual health problems. The most common that can be linked directly to obesity in America are diabetes and heart disease. Both of these are inflammatory diseases, both are treatable but both are also quite often fatal. And there's no reason so many Americans should be suffering from these health problems.

So if you find yourself in the overweight or obese group of folks, you need to take a good look at your diet and exercise routines. The first thing you should do is regulate your portion control. Adult males don't need more than two thousand calories a day. To put that into perspective, a Big Mac is about 550 calories. Add fries and a coke, and you're over one thousand calories for the day.

So be smart about what you eat. Instead of going with the oversized, deluxe order of beef with fries, get a piece of chicken or fish (not fried, by the way) and a salad or some sauteed vegetables.

You should also work out regularly. Start slow, doing perhaps twenty minutes of cardio three or four times per week. As you get more fit, you can bump it up to more times per week for a longer, or more strenuous workout. For me personally, I've found that eating a balanced diet and getting in regular exercise has helped with many of my health problems, from arthritis to chronic fatigue.