Posted on Aug 16, 2020
SPC Emergency Medical Technician (Emt)
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For the last ten years the obesity rate has skyrocketed in the country. Experts estimate at this pace next year half of the United States population will be considered in the obese category. What can we do about this? Thoughts? Plans? If the rate continues to grow we will even have a smaller percentage to fill the ranks of the military.
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Responses: 8
SFC Michael Hasbun
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In the last 20+ years, over several deployments, I can honestly say that I've seen dozens of missions fail because a Soldier/Leader was dumb/incompetent.
However I have never seen a mission fail because a Soldiers APFT score or Weight...
Our institutional priorities are wrong.
Stupid Soldiers will destroy the Army long before overweight Soldiers can mange to.
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CSM Darieus ZaGara
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It started with the poor decisions made by politicians and local leaders who began to take varying activities away from schools. It was further exacerbated by the advent of video games and kids staying inside rather than outside. Now this kids and the generation that followed are still playing games as adults and stuck in the house. My kids, in there 30’s were encouraged to be outside (forced if necessary), while one of them still enjoys playing these games he works out every day. Unfortunately that cannot be said for his and the subsequent generation. The final nail in the wooden box is that these two generations don’t like to cook, and eat fast food along with processed foods. I could go on, but these are issues at the core of the problem. Failed government decisions based on budget, the advent of technology, poor diet, and lazy/poor parenting.

I will close by saying that there is a large segment of society that break this norm, unfortunately not enough.
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Lt Col Charlie Brown
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It's a concern. We can help those who would be otherwise eligible change. Obesity doesn't have to be lielong. Part of it is education. Nutrition and lifestyle. We caput young people in our DEP and work with them
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SPC Emergency Medical Technician (Emt)
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I agree. We of all people can play a huge role in this situation. I believe we really need to start educating children early in schools to
make smarter nutrition choices. We also need to stop sugar coating the problem. I am all for body positivity, but there comes a point when it’s not positivity it’s simply unhealthy. Let’s not hide the fact that most medical deaths in this country are related to obesity. Yet here we are offering free bags of chips, Pepsi’s etc at some COVID-19 testing sites. As well as the fact that survival rates are substantially lower during this pandemic in the obese. I really think this needs brought to the forefront of issues for the next decade before it is too late.
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