New CDC Stats on Obesity & Diabetes

by: Jill Richardson

Sun Jul 05, 2009 at 17:02:26 PM PDT

The CDC has just released preliminary results of the 2008 National Health Interview Survey.  These include, among other measures, data charts and tables on obesity (rates still rising steadily since 1997), physical activity (no measurable change), and diabetes (rising in parallel with obesity).

Interpretation: if physical activity rates have not changed, then the reason obesity rates are going up is because people are eating more calories.

Parke Wilde comments on the various theories on why we are seeing epidemic obesity. Tom Laskawy warns no health care reform without food system reform. And Kerry Trueman says:

If you think diabetes and obesity are the two biggest health care crises Americans face these days, you're missing the forest for the trees - literally. Because the roots of all this diet-induced disease lie in two less publicized but even more pernicious epidemics: nature deficit disorder and kitchen illiteracy.

Below, you'll find the CDC's numbers

Year	Obesity	Smoking	Physical Activity	Diabetes
1997	19.5	24.6	31.8	5.3
1998	20.6	24	29.6	5.4
1999	21.5	23.3	30.1	5.5
2000	21.8	23.1	31.7	6.0
2001	22.9	22.6	31.8	6.4
2002	23.8	22.3	31.7	6.5
2003	23.5	21.5	32.8	6.5
2004	24.3	20.8	30.1	6.9
2005	25.3	20.8	30.1	7.3
2006	26.2	20.8	30.9	7.6
2007	26.6	19.7	30.8	7.5
2008	27.5	20.4	32	7.8

There are major disparities between various ethnicities. Whites are doing the best, with only 26.4% obesity among men, 24.9% among women and just 6.9% diabetes (among both sexes). More whites smoke and get physical activity than the other ethnicities - 22.5% and 35.4% respectively.

Hispanics have 30.4% obesity among men, 33.1% among women, and 10.7% diabetes (among both sexes). 14.5% of Hispanics smoke, and 24.5% engage in physical activity.

Black men are less obese than Hispanics, but black women are more obese. Obesity rates for blacks are 28.4% among men and 41.8% among women. 10.9% of blacks are diagnosed with diabetes. 20.6% smoke and 24.6% engage in physical activity.

I don't have an easy way to compare these statistics by age because the CDC used different age ranges for each measure. However, in general, physical activity goes down as people get older and diabetes goes up.

Age: Physical Activity
18-24: 37.5%
25-64: 33.2%
65-74: 25.8%
75+: 18.5%

Age: Diabetes
18-44: 2.3%
45-54: 9.2%
55-64: 15.3%
65+: 18.3%

Smoking and obesity are a bit less straightforward and it might be because at a certain age, people who are smoke or people who are obese are dying. I don't know. Or it could be that at a certain point, a fear of death kicks in and people get more serious about quitting smoking. That's what happened for my Grandfather. He smoked from age 12 into his late 60's until his doctor told him "If you keep smoking you WILL die." Then he stopped.

Age: Obesity
20-39: 24.4%
40-59: 31.5%
60+: 26.6%

Age: Smoking
18-44: 22.8%
45-64: 22.5%
65+: 9.3%