The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced on Tuesday that obesity rates in the U.S. appear to have reached a plateau, at least for now. The CDC's reports indicated that both adult and child overall obesity rates have not significantly increased since 2003, according to the Wall Street Journal.
Here are some of the key details from the CDC's latest reports and obesity statistics.
* The CDC's findings were part of two separate reports, one focusing on the obesity rate in U.S. adults and the other focusing on the obesity rates among American children. Both have been published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
* The report on obesity in adults, "Prevalence of Obesity and Trends in Body Mass Index Among U.S. Adults, 1999-2010," concluded that rates plateaued between 2009-2010 at approximately 35.5 percent for men and 35.8 percent for women.
* While the overall rate of obesity among women has remained essentially the same over the last decade, specific groups have seen increases, particularly Mexican American and non-Hispanic black women.
* The rate of obesity among men remained essentially the same across all groups.
* This leveling off follows more than two decades of marked increases in the rate of obesity in U.S. adults. From 1976 to 1999, the rate had increased by approximately 16 percent.
* The CDC's report on obesity among children, "Prevalence of Obesity and Trends in Body Mass Index Among U.S. Children and Adolescents, 1999-2010," found that the rate of obesity in children had leveled off between 2009-2010 to remain at approximately 16.9 percent.
* Obesity levels did increase significantly among male children between 1999-2010, but not among female children. This is the first time that the obesity rate among male children was found to be higher than among female children.
* These obesity percentages translate into roughly 78 million adults and 13 million children, according to MSNBC.
* The CDC reports are based on health surveys that are conducted across the United States every two years. The most recent report, from 2009-2010, included some 6,000 adults and 4,000 children. Children are charted from infancy all the way up to age 19.
* In addition to the number of adults and children whose BMI indicated that they are obese, another 33 percent of adults and 15 percent of children had a BMI ranking that indicated that they are overweight.
* Obesity raises a person's risk of developing diabetes, heart disease, sleep apnea, stroke, and some cancers, among other health issues, according to a related report by Business Week.
Vanessa Evans is a musician and freelance writer based in Michigan, with a lifelong interest in health and nutrition issues.
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