The War on Obesity
Sam Smith
ENG 122 English Composition II
Instructor: Holly Ledcke
June 18, 2015

Obesity is a disorder that involves the excessive body fat that could alter a person’s overall health. People eat all types of foods and many of them do not care about the affect of certain types of foods. Obesity is taking a worldwide stance and it seems like it is not going anywhere anytime soon. Obesity is a serious health problem that can be prevented if people eat nutritious foods, educate themselves and their children on how to exercise, and most importantly have the ability to afford to eat and live a healthy lifestyle.
People live in a world with many different types of foods. In the United States, there are many different cultures and people have choices on what they want to eat, they can pick from Chinese food, Jamaican food, and even Mexican food. The foods and ingredients that people pick are very important when it comes to living a healthier and longer life. As for obesity, this is an issue that is everybody’s problem as in being a worldwide problem, “Approximately 12 percent of the population is considered obese, totaling more than 300 million adults around the world” (da Silva, M. H., de Jesus, M. P., Barbosa Merighi, M. A., de Oliveira, D. M., Souto, R. Q., & Biscotto, P. R. 2014 pg. 303).
Some changes can be made in the way a person eats and what they eat. For example, some people are vegans, where they do not eat anything that comes from an animal. A person does not have to go to such measures to handle their health, where some can eat what ever they want and just exercise and still maintain a healthy weight. Finding out what certain food have in them can help also, doing things like counting calories and staying under an amount may work for some.
When dealing with children, some people may not notice but the early years of his or her life is spent watching their parents, therefore whatever their parents do, whatever their parents eat, and the way their parents conduct their life is going to affect that child either in a positive or a negative way. If a person raises their child in a healthy manner, that child will not know any different from what they are seeing at the moment. For example, a child that has never eaten meat, they will not have a craving for it because he or she does not have a sense for meat. So for young children, it is good to set the foundation early on for healthy eating habits with fruits, vegetables and lots of water.
People need to be more proactive in the environment that their children are in, and also they need to know what kind of foods their children consume when they are away from home. The state of New York has begun to cut back certain types of foods to help prevent obesity and health issues in children, “New York City has undertaken several interventions to improve nutrition in public schools in the past decade, including elimination of sugary drinks from beverage vending machines in 2003-2004, shifting from whole milk to 1% fat and skim milk in school