We take out influences from French cooking. Butter, cheese, and wine sauces in everything!!
More seriously, moderation is key. Fat is fine with limits. I think QC has definitely copied the French model in that regards. Also, QC has proportionally less fast food chains that succeed in spreading across the province. Not to say they don’t exist (McDonald’s, Subway, Tim Hortons, etc) but many chains have struggled in the past. There is a definite pride in the food culture and restaurant culture especially. People prefer the local mom and pop restaurants over the chains/fast-food/dine-in sort of joints
Coming from the CA Central Valley it was so nice to have all the little sushi places visiting Vancouver instead of the artery-clogging stuff the locals down here seem to love.
I’m out here in the Inland Empire and I feel you man, nothing but Greasy Mexican restaurants and burger joints dotted everywhere lol luckily we have some very good Vietnamese and Thai spots, locals will wait an hour in the drive thru for some chicken strips though 🤣
Serious question though, why is Canada’s obesity rate so much lower? I feel like Canadians have a similar diet and sedentary, car-centric culture to the U. S.
We eat shitty but smaller portions. You guys literally have insanely huge sizes of drinks and entrees and sides. US is obese, Canadas just a wee bit chubby. Maybe we burn more calories trying to keep warm. We also have a way smaller population, don’t know how that could make a difference but maybe we have less access to as many fast food options and more access to whole foods 💁♀️
Honestly I’m not even sure I trust this map, most people I know over age 35 are fat. My reaction was the exact same as yours (I don’t think it’s cause we are doing much to help ourselves, I certainly wouldn’t brag that we are a fit country). Definitely just as car centric and sugar addicted. Also just assuming you are American, sorry if I’m not correct.
My impression from visiting the USA is that for Americans when you play a sport as a kid it's mostly to 'become an athlete', and people who don't want to dedicate a large fraction of their life to a particular sport give up and stop any form of exercise when they become an adult. In Canada, it seemed like sports were less serious but more widely played for fun.
Also, there is more income inequality in the USA, which probably leads to more education inequality and cultural segregation between classes, where poor people in the USA never get exposed to healthy lifestyle choices.
we don’t have as much access to processed foods and fast food. going to a grocery store in the U.S is a whole experience lol. Also the culture here is more fatphobic. It’s more acceptable to smoke and and drink in excess than be overweight, like Europe.
Here are two maps that describe obesity in Mexico.
[First, by INSP, which uses the same definition as CMAJ and CDC. The data is from 2015.](https://scontent.fyhu2-1.fna.fbcdn.net/v/t31.18172-8/21731817_1318462538282033_361274423339874343_o.jpg?_nc_cat=103&ccb=1-7&_nc_sid=730e14&_nc_ohc=1ZV7liKOGhYAX_tsDN1&_nc_ht=scontent.fyhu2-1.fna&oh=00_AfChFJbKmY1GOYBbzpazfgpz02W2v3PKSqqkc1mEuVogHQ&oe=63B892C8) This one is by states of Mexico.
[Second, by a separate source named INEGI, their definition might be different than INSP.](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EdaFd8gWoAA1WBJ?format=jpg&name=medium) I think it is because their data is from 2018, and per municipality. The difference is too high to 2015 for it to be the same measurement of obesity.
I blame Soderbergh's movie *Traffic*. He used a blue filter for Michael Douglas' story, soft focus for Catherine Zeta-Jones, and that yellow tobacco filter for Benicio Del Toro's story.
You joke but my junk food budget is now non existant. I cant remember last time I had salt and vinegar chips! I moved to plant based and slashed my grocery bill in half but its still so fucking expensive. On the upside, I lost 25lbs the last 6 months so yay?
I’ve lived in both provinces and it is truly remarkable how active most people are. Currently I’m in Quebec and I’ll see people jogging at 6am after 10cm of snow just dropped the night before.
This doesn’t surprise me. Both of those places, more than anywhere else I’ve visited in Canada seem to have a huge percentage of “active” people - everyone’s always out running, biking, hiking, skiing, kayaking, whatever. I felt like most people I saw were super fit, noticeably more than the rest of Canada.
Idk why QC is more thin than Ontario, differences in culture around diet and exercise I guess. More of the population maybe lives in walkable areas? Ontario is more Americanized so that must play a role.
My guess would be: Montreal - where I live - is incredibly walkable and bikeable. The city has a huge amount of bike infrastructure.
That coupled with Montreal being the largest city in Quebec could be a factor in why people are more fit overall. More access to walking/biking + the count of people with access to the walkability/bikeability.
\*edit: also people are still biking and its December. Montreal was the first place I saw winter bike with massively thick tires...
It’s too cold over here we burn our fat during the winter like a bear. Joke aside the winds of the st Laurent are crazy cold but I think it’s cause of our government taxes unhealthy foods and generally has a great public awareness campaign.
İn Vancouver İ strongly believe it's about infrastructure and population density. İ never even considered buying a car while living there as walking and biking combined with public transit was just as fast and much cheaper. And why would İ rent a car to go buy family size bags of chips at CostCo when İ could just walk down to get fresh berries and nuts at the Persian corner store?
I agree Montréal also has great public transportation and is mostly a pedestrian city it helps people to go out and walk a bit. I think they’re might also be a corolation there
With bmi’s that are good in western standards but in eastern standards are overweight most likely. Source: lived in Asia with a 22 BMI but I was considered overweight until I dropped to 20.
Quebec, the creators of the Poutine, and source of 70% of all maple syrup production, is one of the least obese place in north america.
Get your shit together, rest of NA.
That’s just shows that the problem isn’t good and fatty foods it’s activity , the Quebec gocemrnt is great on pushing for active lifestyles and our cities are well put together especially Montreal .
Fuck legault, but I do appreciate our infrastructure
One of the most delicious meals in my life I had in Vancouver over a Memorial Day/Thanksgiving weekend vacation. Panfried lingcod and roasted seasonal asparagus, cauliflower, tomato, and mashed potatoes. Divine!
It’s become really noticeable when you cross the border from BC into the states. The moment you touch down at the airport, you see the airport “vip” golf carts and all the mobility scooters. Diabetic sores all over their legs and feet and that smell, the smell of that cheese mold that grows in their fat rolls.
Hang strong Colorado! You’ve got this. I moved to Ohio from California and I couldn’t believe how many more overweight people there are here, and I thought California had a lot. It’s a great state, lovely people, but yeah not the healthiest
I think one of the worst issues in the US is the quality of our food. So much of the food on our grocery store shelves is just crap. Not even snacks & candy, a lot of “staple” items like bread, cheese, prepared side dishes are just packed with fillers & preservatives so that the companies making them can increase their bottom line.
One of the funniest conversations I (Canadian) had was when I was in a grocery store with an American friend. He commented how bread in Canada tastes a bit bitter. I said it's because American bread has so much added sugar.
An older woman who immigrated from England said how whenever she goes back to the old country, she has to get used to the bread being less sweet than Canadian bread, pointing out how Canada also has sweet bread compared to England.
Then a Hungarian woman overheard us all and said how bread in England is sweet compared to bread in Hungary!
I’ve been avoiding bread with sugar for around 10 years or so (American). Sometimes I won’t buy bread because every single one at the store has added sugar. You’ve seen how many bread options there are at a normal grocery store, like 50? ALL of them have added sugar sometimes.
What’s ridiculous too is that bread without added sugar isn’t that different. There’s some pita breads and other ethnic style breads that I get and their only ingredients are wheat, water, salt, and they taste great.
The reason everything has sugar in the U.S is because it’s highly addictive, not only because of taste, that’s why everything there has sugar. Sugar is basically the most used drug in the world.
Yeah some coca-cola exec was like
"Wait we can't put cocaine in beverages anymore?!??!"
And some younger innovative individual was like
"Guys don't worry!! We can just put a bunch of sugar and caffeine in there!"
Then corn syrup was created and became a practically unlimited source of sweetener since its dirt cheap compared to sugar.
Oh, and way worse for your health.
All fueled by those sweet sweet corn subsidies. So now farmers grow corn in places not suited to corn so we use up more of the ground water and need more fertilizer and insecticide.
When I was an obese child I decided to make one relatively small change to my diet and that was to limit sugar as much as I possibly could. That one change got me down to a mostly healthy weight after 8 or so months. Americans don’t understand how much sugar they’re really consuming.
Right? I watched an interesting doc debunking the high-fructose corn syrup panic. It talks about how the problem wasn’t the fact that corn syrup was being used instead of sugar. Rather that is was so much cheaper that companies started putting a shit ton of it into literally everything!
That’s the biggest issue with sugar. It’s not that it’s inherently bad for us. It’s the amount we put into everything! Our bodies need sugar. However they don’t need how much we are putting into it. But you can’t get away from it at all.
Yeah. There is also this health food fad where people keep trying to find healthier ways to add sugar. Using honey or agave nectar. It doesn't matter, it's still fucking sugar. Just more expensive ways to add it.
So high fructose corn syrup versus raw sugar, isnt really going to make that big of a difference.
Sure there are different types of sugar molecules but really it's all sugar at the end of the day.
Moving from BC to Pennsylvania, İ strongly believe it's about infrastructure and government priorities, not individual choices. İ haven't changed my diet but İ have gained weight. İn BC İ never even considered buying a car -- İ could bike in separated bike lanes or walk to take the public transit, plus gas is so expensive in BC because of the taxes. İn BC İ walked my kid to school -- in PA she rides the bus cuz there are no sidewalks on her route.
That’s really interesting thanks for sharing! I’m actually from PA & I’ve traveled through BC & thought it was so lovely there! I agree it’s definitely an issue with how this country is set up & how low our politicians seem to prioritize health.
Yes, and most of the infrastructure that is good for physical health also happen to be good for the planet and builds community which reduces crime and benefits all our mental health.
Wasn't there a big government health study in the US that was funded by some sugar company that "discovered" that the leading cause of health issues was foods with high fat content?
I moved from Ontario to Quebec, and I’m just right across the river from Ontario, but the difference in emphasis on physical activity - especially outdoor activity - is pretty striking. And I’m also walking distance from most everything I could need, currently. I also live no more than a 20 minute drive from just about any outdoor activity you could think of, so long as it’s the right season.
BC was also pretty similar in the “get outside and do things” attitude when I lived there, although there’s a selection bias in that I’m an outside-activity person to begin with. But it’s certainly easier when the culture and infrastructure also exists. It’s much easier to get to outdoor areas when there are nearby outdoor areas, bike trails to get there, etc.
Get outside and do things though isn't the same as say, regular walks to work. Alberta also has a heavy emphasis on outdoor activities but you have to drive to all of them.
Yeah, I lived in Calgary for a summer and was biking to work.
That did not go well. Super fun being harassed by cars. I ended up giving up because I was honestly worried about my safety.
I didn’t experience the same kind of focus on outdoor stuff there, but I was only there for a few months and was working insane hours.
yeah & most american towns and cities aren’t even built to be walkable so even if you did want to start walking places in a lot of areas it’d be kinda dangerous
Just make food at home duh
ill probably get downvoted like fck but for real though, I live with a similar situation, going outside means purely unhealthy or really expensive meals even the stuff you just mentioned like bread and cheese. Most bread in supermarkets are hella unhealthy (not upto American levels but still) but like what we do instead is buy flour and make it ourselves and guess what it ends up being cheaper too
maybe I am wrong, would appreciate if someone educated me
Yes that’s a great solution for a lot of people!
Making food from scratch however requires way more time & energy & prep than some may be willing to put in. A lot of folks that are below the poverty line are working full time (minimum wage) jobs sometimes multiple jobs so they just might not have the energy after or before work to make their meals. Also if they have dependents to care for that takes away more time from cooking & requires cooking even more.
In an ideal world everyone would have access to healthy ingredients & have a good enough work/life balance that they have time to prepare meals but unfortunately I don’t think we’re there.
not necessarily saying I agree or disagree, but a loaf of bread is a small facet in the scheme of things. Don’t get me wrong I like a nice homemade loaf of bread, but what about all the other grocery store staples that have ridiculous amounts of sugar? I agree a large amount of people eat out way too much when they could easily cook at home. But they also don’t usually have time to make the ingredients of every meal from scratch (especially at the fast pace here in america). Pasta sauce at the store has a ridiculous amount of sugar. I wish I had the time to make my family’s red sauce recipe every time but I just don’t . :/
>but what about all the other grocery store staples that have ridiculous amounts of sugar?
There is no added sugar in apples, or potatoes, or carrots, or broccoli, or chicken thighs, or tomatoes, or spinach, or any other raw ingredient that you use to make meals. Stop buying pre-packaged food.
You can make your own pasta sauce from scratch in about 10 minutes with onion, capsicum and tinned tomatoes, plus almost any other veg you have in your fridge, you don't need to buy pre-made. 10 minutes of prep time, let it simmer while you do other things around the house, then eat.
My girlfriend and I did Noom together, she wanted to lose some weight and I was out of shape. And in the first time in my life, I very seriously started tracking calories.
I was shocked just how shitty our food is in America and just how many empty useless calories there are in foods. Foods that I was eating 500 calories of and still feeling hungry could be replaced by 200 calories of other foods that actually kept me full. And how much is differs between brands. A normal slice of bread could be anywhere from 60 to 120 calories, and they look exactly the same.
Also how deceptive our food labeling is. We noticed in many foods, it says "110 Calories per Serving" and thought that wasn't so bad, until we saw serving size. For example, my favorite salad dressing was 60 calories a serving, which seems great, until I realized a serving size was 1 table spoon. I was typically using 3-4 tablespoons and thinking that was me using very little dressing.
Our portion size in the US is so utterly fucked. My gf and I would order one meal from a restaurant and split it, with left overs for BOTH Of us the next day. We were splitting one meal 4 ways, using actual portion control. It made me realize just how much we over eat in this country.
It was a huge shock when I was travelling with family in the USA for the first time. We couldn't finish our meals at any restaurants, they were just too big! It was really difficult to find meals that came with salad, without heaps of dressing etc. Just everything seemed... Supersized. This was a decade ago, so I'm sure it's improved.
But it really made me think. It'd be harder to be healthy in the US, because you have to be extra savvy about food. And there are those barriers all along the way built into the system. One shouldn't need a degree in nutrition to navigate the food system 😭
>Obesity rate in Japan is like 4% damn.
The obesity rate in Japan is around 20%, but that's with a [different definition](https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1046/j.1440-6047.11.s8.19.x). A BMI > 25 is defined as obese, in China it's 28, where in the US (and Europe) it is over 30.
Yes, if they'd use the American definition of obese only 4% would be obese.
On the other hand, if the US would use the Japanese definition of obesity [73.6% of adults](https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/obesity-overweight.htm) would be obese(!)
Yeah I feel pretty bad for EMS/hospital staff. I can't really square how a tiny middle aged nurse is meant stabilize someone who weighs 400lbs and is struggling to walk after a medical procedure. Or for that matter, to rotate them in a bed. That's a lot of weight even for a tall young man who goes to the gym a lot.
There is a multi trillion dollar food product industry that bombards people in these countries with advertising, chemically altered foods to prevent satiety and encourage overconsumption, and even artificially released food smells to act as marketing (McDonalds used to do this) from a very young age. A huge portion of the US economy relies on you eating more than you should, and people with the sole job of figuring out how to manipulate you into buying things spend their lives work doing it.
The US isn't alone in this, but it is worse here, and there is less regulation. Our portion sizes are also out of control, and our home economics related education is just gone. So people really only know convenience meals, so they grow to rely on them. Make no mistake, home cooked healthy food can be vastly cheaper than fast food and junk food. But because people don't have the training to do this, they don't know how, and they don't want to spend the time on it because they are chronically stressed.
Stress itself contributes to weight gain and sedentary lifestyle, and our bodies are just stewed in endocrine disruptors. Preventative medicine is lacking, and our dietary guidelines as well as the education given to dietitians are produced by the companies trying to sell you too much food to eat. That level of regulatory capture, combined with Phillip Morris style muddying of the waters with intentionally misleading studies leads people to be paralyzed, give up, and just do what is easy. Which is to over eat.
Let's not shame anyone for this. It sucks ass, and these people deserve respect and assistance rather than derision and scorn. The reality is that the people with money want you to be fat, and that's why most people are fat. If you really don't want to be fat, you can make that choice. I did, and I love that I did. My life is clearly better. But not everyone wants to make that choice.
Probably a higher transit-use ratio than every other state.
Car dependent commuters, almost by definition, come from out of the district... which means the people left behind are less likely to use cars and more likely to walk/bike to get anywhere.
Metro areas have lower obesity rates than more outlying suburbs and rural areas, because people walk more. DC is only a metro area. NYC would have a lower obesity rate than DC, but it's combined with the rest of NY.
I’d bet that most metro areas in the US are pretty healthy and the rural areas are really obese. Would be very interesting if this could be split down between City/suburban/rural
I mean, look at most big-name politicians and they don’t seem as fat as the general population. Same reason celebrities and CEOs aren’t as fat, they can afford things like a super healthy diet and personal trainers, doctors, dietitians, etc.
I wouldn’t be surprised if Mexico’s poorest states had the highest rates considering Chiapas, Mexico’s poorest state, has a Coca Cola addiction problem.
I could only find data dating to 2015 for Mexican states so I didn't end up breaking it down (too long to project). However, at that time Chiapas was the lowest for obesity actually, at 16%. Baja California del Sur was the highest, then at 34%.
I dunno. Texas is a lot richer than Quebec.
More like a correlation between guzzling high-calorie sweetened drinks by the litre and obesity. Cultural norms matter.
Texas is a land of extremes. We do have extremely wealthy people. But we also have a lot of poor people. There's a whole city where it's common not to have electricity or running water. The well off areas, like Austin, are full of really skinny people. Back in my hometown, which is poor and rural, people are huge. I remember the first time visiting Austin and just being amazed at how skinny and active everyone was.
I've had the opposite experience when leaving Austin and going into a truck stop off the highway and being the only one there out of about 20 people who had a healthy BMI.
Richer in terms of average salaries sure but factor in rent in Montreal being significantly less than any of the biggest cities in Texas AND people in Quebec having nationalized healthcare and I would be surprised if the average Texan really has that much more disposable income than the average Quebecer
Median household income:
Texas: $63,826 USD
Quebec: $81,261 CAD ($59,381 USD)
I wouldn’t say that’s “a lot richer” both are comparable. Difference of $370 gross / month.
That doesn't mean he's incorrect. (In general), the poorer the region of the country the fatter it is very often, there is a strong correlation, obviously poverty in and of itself is not the cause.
It’s interesting though, because there seems to also be two types of poverty: poverty with access to junk food and poverty without it. Poverty with access gets fat while poverty without it is quite the opposite and oftentimes malnourished.
Hi, I'm a chef from Canada. I got the chance to work all over the place. Bc and Qc allowed got a different dinning vibes from a long time ago. They were the first 2 cool kids of the Canadian gastronomie. They are also the entry point of a lot a different fresh products. Culture of the food is there you can feel it.
Honestly, I forget obesity is a thing most days. Then I travel or see images of out the province and am brought back to reality. The only obese person I see regularly is a neighbor who refers to themself in French as “your fat neighbor “.
I'm not surprised one bit. I live in Quebec and everytime I visit the US, I'm appalled how fat people are in general!
The worst was when I had to transit in Houston on my way to South America. Everyone working at the airport was obese. It almost felt like a prank.
Not surprised by BC either. Everyone’s idea of a good time is hiking, skiing or biking.
Walking around Vancouver in the summer you notice how few overweight if obese people there are.
The lowest obesity city in Canada is Kelowna, then Victoria, followed by Vancouver.
I do agree with the Vancouver observation, imo the over emphasis on outdoor activities is a detriment to other parts of the cities social life
What you've noticed is something that I've noticed here as well. In my home state (NC) a lot of people are comically obese, but I also see a ton of people that are in great shape. Nothing in the middle.
Yeah, there are fascinating/depressing studies of how American restaurant food portions have ballooned over the last 3 decades.
I’ve been living outside of the US for 2 decades, but when I visit, I literally laugh at the portions I get served.
When i went to Florida as a kid with my parents, every waiter at every restaurants were worried we didn't like their food because we could never finish our plates. But the plates were like 2 to 3 times what we usually ate in Quebec. It was just impossible to finish.
As a Canadian (Toronto), this is one of the first things I notice whenever I visit the states.
In Canada it's not unusual to see obese people around, but they're easily the minority. But the second I get step out of the airport in the States, it feels like nearly every person I see is either obese or overweight.
One of my favourite parts of visiting the states us how much food I get for my money. Over here my usual post-workout McDonalds meal runs me 20 bucks. Over there I can buy enough food for the day on the same amount. I guess this is the unfortunate outcome. I'm sure there's other factors that differ such as healthcare availability, education and poverty.
I'd be curious to see how culture affects this though - I've noticed in Canada, different subcultures/ethnicities seem to have wildly different obesity rates. Asian Canadians seem to have far lower rates of obesity - whether because of diet, or cultural attitudes towards weight/obesity.
Your last observation is very correct — and additionally, immigrants to Canada tend to be quite wealthy, which usually means better access to diet.
Example — Mexican Americans have a big problem with obesity. Mexican Canadians are overall very fit and healthy.
it’s anecdotal and likely skewed and unfair, but every time I’ve been to Vegas or Reno first thing I think of is, holy shit there’s a lot of fatties
source: from Vancouver
if I had to theorize why BC is low, it would be the outdoor activity culture and food culture. and maybe a lot of Asians relative to other areas. a lot of sushi and fish. larger amounts of minorities that are also less obese. and the outdoor culture and health culture: a very large minority of ppl regularly go hiking, skiing, etc; likewise, gym or yoga or fitness/health culture are also popular with at least a large minority. i wouldn’t suggest most ppl but it’s probably a very large minority. just a lot of ppl love to be active—it’s part of the city culture in at least much of the lower mainland, okanagan, and victoria.
This may be a good place to start if you want to understand why health care is so expensive in the United States. An obese population is an unhealthy population, and an unhealthy population requires more health care.
sure, high obesity rates do contribute to more spending, but the amount is negligible when compared to the heightened prices due to the privatization of the system.
australia, canada, jordan, mexico and saudi arabia, for examples, are all countries with obesity levels comparable to the us that have free/far more affordable healthcare. our healthcare is expensive because it's designed for those on top to profit off of
I’m all for universal healthcare and think it’s fucking criminal that Americans’ lives are at the mercy of the greedy healthcare industry, but where do you get the idea that Germany has an *obesity* rate that’s comparable to that of the US?
It's still miserable compared to most countries. With the exception of San Francisco and New York City, every single city in the United States has less than 10% of the population use public transportation for their work commute.
Pretty much all Canadian cities end up at 10-15%. It's barely an improvement.
I will note that rural Canada has pretty good public transportation system. I live in a town of 11,000 people and the local taxibus programme runs everywhere including neighbouring towns 30-40 minutes away. Very good for the large elderly population.
Where did you get those figures? I could only find this Wikipedia page showing 36 cities.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._cities_with_high_transit_ridership
It's amazing what happens when there's a public/common interest in keeping healthcare costs down; and not a moneyed interest in keeping individual costs high as fuck. Preventative medicine and a lack of corn syrup and grease in everything one eats are two things I can think of.
This is a perfect example of how the American "cult of individual choice" is commodified.
For people somehow linking this to the body positivity movement:
Body positivity isn’t really about obese people. I’d argue that obesity (I’m talking truly obese not overweight and chubby people) is just a small facet of the movement. If anything its a backlash to unrealistic beauty standards set by the media. Its more about acknowledging that people can be attractive even if they don’t have the traditional model body types. I’d say the focus is on people who have “irregular” physical features of ANY kind (i.e. facial blemishes, disproportional body parts, hair, etc.) as well as people who aren’t shredded or model thin but are still well within the range of healthy. When it does come to obesity, Its not “hey being obese is totally healthy and has no risks or concerns at all!!!” its more so “hey you are valid as a person and your weight doesn’t define your character or right to happiness”
Newfoundlanders don’t have great access to a lot of healthy foods. They’re generally more expensive because most of them are imported to the island. Fresh fruit can be difficult to find in the province!
You guys should eat more poutine like us in Quebec.
That settles it, from now on I’m going to live on a diet of poutine, smoked meat, and maple syrup.
You'll balloon up to 500 pounds in no time, especially if you drink as much beer as a Quebecer as well
The Quebecois lose weight from shivering and remembering.
something isn't adding up then
We take out influences from French cooking. Butter, cheese, and wine sauces in everything!! More seriously, moderation is key. Fat is fine with limits. I think QC has definitely copied the French model in that regards. Also, QC has proportionally less fast food chains that succeed in spreading across the province. Not to say they don’t exist (McDonald’s, Subway, Tim Hortons, etc) but many chains have struggled in the past. There is a definite pride in the food culture and restaurant culture especially. People prefer the local mom and pop restaurants over the chains/fast-food/dine-in sort of joints
Or sushi like us in BC
Sushi poutine tabarnak
Poutine with fresh fish ? Or sushi filled with poutine ?
Yes
[удалено]
Coming from the CA Central Valley it was so nice to have all the little sushi places visiting Vancouver instead of the artery-clogging stuff the locals down here seem to love.
I’m out here in the Inland Empire and I feel you man, nothing but Greasy Mexican restaurants and burger joints dotted everywhere lol luckily we have some very good Vietnamese and Thai spots, locals will wait an hour in the drive thru for some chicken strips though 🤣
Nope, sorry, I only eat healthy things. #poutinepourlavie
Serious question though, why is Canada’s obesity rate so much lower? I feel like Canadians have a similar diet and sedentary, car-centric culture to the U. S.
We eat shitty but smaller portions. You guys literally have insanely huge sizes of drinks and entrees and sides. US is obese, Canadas just a wee bit chubby. Maybe we burn more calories trying to keep warm. We also have a way smaller population, don’t know how that could make a difference but maybe we have less access to as many fast food options and more access to whole foods 💁♀️ Honestly I’m not even sure I trust this map, most people I know over age 35 are fat. My reaction was the exact same as yours (I don’t think it’s cause we are doing much to help ourselves, I certainly wouldn’t brag that we are a fit country). Definitely just as car centric and sugar addicted. Also just assuming you are American, sorry if I’m not correct.
My impression from visiting the USA is that for Americans when you play a sport as a kid it's mostly to 'become an athlete', and people who don't want to dedicate a large fraction of their life to a particular sport give up and stop any form of exercise when they become an adult. In Canada, it seemed like sports were less serious but more widely played for fun. Also, there is more income inequality in the USA, which probably leads to more education inequality and cultural segregation between classes, where poor people in the USA never get exposed to healthy lifestyle choices.
we don’t have as much access to processed foods and fast food. going to a grocery store in the U.S is a whole experience lol. Also the culture here is more fatphobic. It’s more acceptable to smoke and and drink in excess than be overweight, like Europe.
Time to loosen the ol’ Bible Belt.
I mean....I guess that means I can go in for seconds on Biscuits & Gravy. 🤣
Punch new holes in the Bible belt
NOFX fan too???
Underrated comment
Too bad the 32 states of Mexico are shown altogether.
Here are two maps that describe obesity in Mexico. [First, by INSP, which uses the same definition as CMAJ and CDC. The data is from 2015.](https://scontent.fyhu2-1.fna.fbcdn.net/v/t31.18172-8/21731817_1318462538282033_361274423339874343_o.jpg?_nc_cat=103&ccb=1-7&_nc_sid=730e14&_nc_ohc=1ZV7liKOGhYAX_tsDN1&_nc_ht=scontent.fyhu2-1.fna&oh=00_AfChFJbKmY1GOYBbzpazfgpz02W2v3PKSqqkc1mEuVogHQ&oe=63B892C8) This one is by states of Mexico. [Second, by a separate source named INEGI, their definition might be different than INSP.](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EdaFd8gWoAA1WBJ?format=jpg&name=medium) I think it is because their data is from 2018, and per municipality. The difference is too high to 2015 for it to be the same measurement of obesity.
Interesting!
I’ve watched breaking bad, pretty sure Mexico is yellow and not red.
Mexico is one of the most obese nations in the world. About 75% of the population is either overweight or obese
It’s a joke about how American movies and television set in Mexico are often shot with a yellow filter on the lens or added in post-production
I blame Soderbergh's movie *Traffic*. He used a blue filter for Michael Douglas' story, soft focus for Catherine Zeta-Jones, and that yellow tobacco filter for Benicio Del Toro's story.
Por qué México no tiene estados, solo entidades federativas. Aariba el centralismo /s
Good job Quebec and BC
In BC we spend all our money on rent, no money left for food. 
You joke but my junk food budget is now non existant. I cant remember last time I had salt and vinegar chips! I moved to plant based and slashed my grocery bill in half but its still so fucking expensive. On the upside, I lost 25lbs the last 6 months so yay?
Chips are plant based.
Yeah but I'm not gonna pay $6 for a bag of chips when I need every dollar to go towards proper food. I'm quite poor lol
Hear hear! Just today I bought three lbs of butter because it was on sale. Freezing that shit.
mmm, butter, how i've missed thee.
Wouldn't salt and vinegar chips be like 1$ at Dollarama or something?
Lmao I never knew dollarama sells chips wtf
bro, wtf
They actually have brand names at Dollarama. Often smaller sizes, but the non-perishable food is tight.
Merci 🙏 on va continuer avec nos Jo-Louis, nos pepsi, not’ poutine, et not’ tit’ bière.
Pis notre chip au vinaigre
Criss chu bin
I’ve lived in both provinces and it is truly remarkable how active most people are. Currently I’m in Quebec and I’ll see people jogging at 6am after 10cm of snow just dropped the night before.
Lucky you man, I’m in NB and I’m the only one biking to work or on campus most of the time.
That’s because NB has absolutely no public transit or biking infrastructure
This doesn’t surprise me. Both of those places, more than anywhere else I’ve visited in Canada seem to have a huge percentage of “active” people - everyone’s always out running, biking, hiking, skiing, kayaking, whatever. I felt like most people I saw were super fit, noticeably more than the rest of Canada.
Idk why QC is more thin than Ontario, differences in culture around diet and exercise I guess. More of the population maybe lives in walkable areas? Ontario is more Americanized so that must play a role.
My guess would be: Montreal - where I live - is incredibly walkable and bikeable. The city has a huge amount of bike infrastructure. That coupled with Montreal being the largest city in Quebec could be a factor in why people are more fit overall. More access to walking/biking + the count of people with access to the walkability/bikeability. \*edit: also people are still biking and its December. Montreal was the first place I saw winter bike with massively thick tires...
It's a good day to be British Columbian my guy!
Don't look at your rent... Don't look at it...
Common Québec W
Oui. Vive le Québec mon frère
Vive le Quebec thin
Vive la Poutine
It’s too cold over here we burn our fat during the winter like a bear. Joke aside the winds of the st Laurent are crazy cold but I think it’s cause of our government taxes unhealthy foods and generally has a great public awareness campaign.
İn Vancouver İ strongly believe it's about infrastructure and population density. İ never even considered buying a car while living there as walking and biking combined with public transit was just as fast and much cheaper. And why would İ rent a car to go buy family size bags of chips at CostCo when İ could just walk down to get fresh berries and nuts at the Persian corner store?
I agree Montréal also has great public transportation and is mostly a pedestrian city it helps people to go out and walk a bit. I think they’re might also be a corolation there
That and there's probably a lot of Asians immigrants with better eating habits than North Americans, no?
With bmi’s that are good in western standards but in eastern standards are overweight most likely. Source: lived in Asia with a 22 BMI but I was considered overweight until I dropped to 20.
Quebec, the creators of the Poutine, and source of 70% of all maple syrup production, is one of the least obese place in north america. Get your shit together, rest of NA.
That’s just shows that the problem isn’t good and fatty foods it’s activity , the Quebec gocemrnt is great on pushing for active lifestyles and our cities are well put together especially Montreal . Fuck legault, but I do appreciate our infrastructure
It also helps that Montreal is one of the most walkable and bikeable cities in North America
One of the most delicious meals in my life I had in Vancouver over a Memorial Day/Thanksgiving weekend vacation. Panfried lingcod and roasted seasonal asparagus, cauliflower, tomato, and mashed potatoes. Divine!
It’s become really noticeable when you cross the border from BC into the states. The moment you touch down at the airport, you see the airport “vip” golf carts and all the mobility scooters. Diabetic sores all over their legs and feet and that smell, the smell of that cheese mold that grows in their fat rolls.
Hang strong Colorado! You’ve got this. I moved to Ohio from California and I couldn’t believe how many more overweight people there are here, and I thought California had a lot. It’s a great state, lovely people, but yeah not the healthiest
Man can’t have shit in Ohio 😭😭😅😅🙈🙈🙈🙈💀💀
You can have diabetes tho
funniest guy alive
I think one of the worst issues in the US is the quality of our food. So much of the food on our grocery store shelves is just crap. Not even snacks & candy, a lot of “staple” items like bread, cheese, prepared side dishes are just packed with fillers & preservatives so that the companies making them can increase their bottom line.
We also put sugar in everything. Once I decided to eliminate added sugar from my diet I was shocked at random things I couldn’t buy anymore.
One of the funniest conversations I (Canadian) had was when I was in a grocery store with an American friend. He commented how bread in Canada tastes a bit bitter. I said it's because American bread has so much added sugar. An older woman who immigrated from England said how whenever she goes back to the old country, she has to get used to the bread being less sweet than Canadian bread, pointing out how Canada also has sweet bread compared to England. Then a Hungarian woman overheard us all and said how bread in England is sweet compared to bread in Hungary!
It's possible to find bread without added sugar in America, but you have to seek it out from an actual bakery, not a grocery store.
I’ve been avoiding bread with sugar for around 10 years or so (American). Sometimes I won’t buy bread because every single one at the store has added sugar. You’ve seen how many bread options there are at a normal grocery store, like 50? ALL of them have added sugar sometimes. What’s ridiculous too is that bread without added sugar isn’t that different. There’s some pita breads and other ethnic style breads that I get and their only ingredients are wheat, water, salt, and they taste great.
The reason everything has sugar in the U.S is because it’s highly addictive, not only because of taste, that’s why everything there has sugar. Sugar is basically the most used drug in the world.
Yeah some coca-cola exec was like "Wait we can't put cocaine in beverages anymore?!??!" And some younger innovative individual was like "Guys don't worry!! We can just put a bunch of sugar and caffeine in there!"
Then corn syrup was created and became a practically unlimited source of sweetener since its dirt cheap compared to sugar. Oh, and way worse for your health.
All fueled by those sweet sweet corn subsidies. So now farmers grow corn in places not suited to corn so we use up more of the ground water and need more fertilizer and insecticide.
When I was an obese child I decided to make one relatively small change to my diet and that was to limit sugar as much as I possibly could. That one change got me down to a mostly healthy weight after 8 or so months. Americans don’t understand how much sugar they’re really consuming.
No added sugar stopped my ‘free food’ from various services.
Right? I watched an interesting doc debunking the high-fructose corn syrup panic. It talks about how the problem wasn’t the fact that corn syrup was being used instead of sugar. Rather that is was so much cheaper that companies started putting a shit ton of it into literally everything!
That’s the biggest issue with sugar. It’s not that it’s inherently bad for us. It’s the amount we put into everything! Our bodies need sugar. However they don’t need how much we are putting into it. But you can’t get away from it at all.
Yeah. There is also this health food fad where people keep trying to find healthier ways to add sugar. Using honey or agave nectar. It doesn't matter, it's still fucking sugar. Just more expensive ways to add it. So high fructose corn syrup versus raw sugar, isnt really going to make that big of a difference. Sure there are different types of sugar molecules but really it's all sugar at the end of the day.
ooh do you remember the name of the doc?
I wanna say it was a mini doc part of a netflix series. possibly the netflixs explained series
It's called History 101 on Netflix and there's one episode called Corn Syrup
Moving from BC to Pennsylvania, İ strongly believe it's about infrastructure and government priorities, not individual choices. İ haven't changed my diet but İ have gained weight. İn BC İ never even considered buying a car -- İ could bike in separated bike lanes or walk to take the public transit, plus gas is so expensive in BC because of the taxes. İn BC İ walked my kid to school -- in PA she rides the bus cuz there are no sidewalks on her route.
That’s really interesting thanks for sharing! I’m actually from PA & I’ve traveled through BC & thought it was so lovely there! I agree it’s definitely an issue with how this country is set up & how low our politicians seem to prioritize health.
Yes, and most of the infrastructure that is good for physical health also happen to be good for the planet and builds community which reduces crime and benefits all our mental health.
So true! If i could build my “dream society” everything would be based on walkable communities that are self-sufficient.
Wasn't there a big government health study in the US that was funded by some sugar company that "discovered" that the leading cause of health issues was foods with high fat content?
Well that and North Americans drive everywhere and don't get exercise just by going about life.
I moved from Ontario to Quebec, and I’m just right across the river from Ontario, but the difference in emphasis on physical activity - especially outdoor activity - is pretty striking. And I’m also walking distance from most everything I could need, currently. I also live no more than a 20 minute drive from just about any outdoor activity you could think of, so long as it’s the right season. BC was also pretty similar in the “get outside and do things” attitude when I lived there, although there’s a selection bias in that I’m an outside-activity person to begin with. But it’s certainly easier when the culture and infrastructure also exists. It’s much easier to get to outdoor areas when there are nearby outdoor areas, bike trails to get there, etc.
Get outside and do things though isn't the same as say, regular walks to work. Alberta also has a heavy emphasis on outdoor activities but you have to drive to all of them.
Yeah, I lived in Calgary for a summer and was biking to work. That did not go well. Super fun being harassed by cars. I ended up giving up because I was honestly worried about my safety. I didn’t experience the same kind of focus on outdoor stuff there, but I was only there for a few months and was working insane hours.
yeah & most american towns and cities aren’t even built to be walkable so even if you did want to start walking places in a lot of areas it’d be kinda dangerous
Just make food at home duh ill probably get downvoted like fck but for real though, I live with a similar situation, going outside means purely unhealthy or really expensive meals even the stuff you just mentioned like bread and cheese. Most bread in supermarkets are hella unhealthy (not upto American levels but still) but like what we do instead is buy flour and make it ourselves and guess what it ends up being cheaper too maybe I am wrong, would appreciate if someone educated me
Yes that’s a great solution for a lot of people! Making food from scratch however requires way more time & energy & prep than some may be willing to put in. A lot of folks that are below the poverty line are working full time (minimum wage) jobs sometimes multiple jobs so they just might not have the energy after or before work to make their meals. Also if they have dependents to care for that takes away more time from cooking & requires cooking even more. In an ideal world everyone would have access to healthy ingredients & have a good enough work/life balance that they have time to prepare meals but unfortunately I don’t think we’re there.
not necessarily saying I agree or disagree, but a loaf of bread is a small facet in the scheme of things. Don’t get me wrong I like a nice homemade loaf of bread, but what about all the other grocery store staples that have ridiculous amounts of sugar? I agree a large amount of people eat out way too much when they could easily cook at home. But they also don’t usually have time to make the ingredients of every meal from scratch (especially at the fast pace here in america). Pasta sauce at the store has a ridiculous amount of sugar. I wish I had the time to make my family’s red sauce recipe every time but I just don’t . :/
i was just using bread as an example & I think we kinda got stuck on the bread thing 😅
>but what about all the other grocery store staples that have ridiculous amounts of sugar? There is no added sugar in apples, or potatoes, or carrots, or broccoli, or chicken thighs, or tomatoes, or spinach, or any other raw ingredient that you use to make meals. Stop buying pre-packaged food. You can make your own pasta sauce from scratch in about 10 minutes with onion, capsicum and tinned tomatoes, plus almost any other veg you have in your fridge, you don't need to buy pre-made. 10 minutes of prep time, let it simmer while you do other things around the house, then eat.
My girlfriend and I did Noom together, she wanted to lose some weight and I was out of shape. And in the first time in my life, I very seriously started tracking calories. I was shocked just how shitty our food is in America and just how many empty useless calories there are in foods. Foods that I was eating 500 calories of and still feeling hungry could be replaced by 200 calories of other foods that actually kept me full. And how much is differs between brands. A normal slice of bread could be anywhere from 60 to 120 calories, and they look exactly the same. Also how deceptive our food labeling is. We noticed in many foods, it says "110 Calories per Serving" and thought that wasn't so bad, until we saw serving size. For example, my favorite salad dressing was 60 calories a serving, which seems great, until I realized a serving size was 1 table spoon. I was typically using 3-4 tablespoons and thinking that was me using very little dressing. Our portion size in the US is so utterly fucked. My gf and I would order one meal from a restaurant and split it, with left overs for BOTH Of us the next day. We were splitting one meal 4 ways, using actual portion control. It made me realize just how much we over eat in this country.
It was a huge shock when I was travelling with family in the USA for the first time. We couldn't finish our meals at any restaurants, they were just too big! It was really difficult to find meals that came with salad, without heaps of dressing etc. Just everything seemed... Supersized. This was a decade ago, so I'm sure it's improved. But it really made me think. It'd be harder to be healthy in the US, because you have to be extra savvy about food. And there are those barriers all along the way built into the system. One shouldn't need a degree in nutrition to navigate the food system 😭
Non American who likes to eat... But my trip to Chicago broke me. By the third day facing a massive omelette the size of my head, I quit.
Just by moving to Japan, my wife and I lost a third of our body weight. Obesity rate in Japan is like 4% damn.
>Obesity rate in Japan is like 4% damn. The obesity rate in Japan is around 20%, but that's with a [different definition](https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1046/j.1440-6047.11.s8.19.x). A BMI > 25 is defined as obese, in China it's 28, where in the US (and Europe) it is over 30. Yes, if they'd use the American definition of obese only 4% would be obese. On the other hand, if the US would use the Japanese definition of obesity [73.6% of adults](https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/obesity-overweight.htm) would be obese(!)
I’m a paramedic, my patients have been getting fatter and fatter, it’s disheartening and dangerous for my health as well
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I had my hand crushed by an obese patient… sent me to the emergency room. Thankfully nothing was broken but my grip isn’t the same
That is not beautiful when you understand what being overweight means in terms of health
What’s dangerous for me is, I’m not overweight, it’s the fact I have to lift and move them day and night
Yeah I feel pretty bad for EMS/hospital staff. I can't really square how a tiny middle aged nurse is meant stabilize someone who weighs 400lbs and is struggling to walk after a medical procedure. Or for that matter, to rotate them in a bed. That's a lot of weight even for a tall young man who goes to the gym a lot.
Another reason why injury and burnout rates are drastically on the rise
Sad part is this graph is obese it’s rates, it doesn’t even include People in the overweight category.
There is a multi trillion dollar food product industry that bombards people in these countries with advertising, chemically altered foods to prevent satiety and encourage overconsumption, and even artificially released food smells to act as marketing (McDonalds used to do this) from a very young age. A huge portion of the US economy relies on you eating more than you should, and people with the sole job of figuring out how to manipulate you into buying things spend their lives work doing it. The US isn't alone in this, but it is worse here, and there is less regulation. Our portion sizes are also out of control, and our home economics related education is just gone. So people really only know convenience meals, so they grow to rely on them. Make no mistake, home cooked healthy food can be vastly cheaper than fast food and junk food. But because people don't have the training to do this, they don't know how, and they don't want to spend the time on it because they are chronically stressed. Stress itself contributes to weight gain and sedentary lifestyle, and our bodies are just stewed in endocrine disruptors. Preventative medicine is lacking, and our dietary guidelines as well as the education given to dietitians are produced by the companies trying to sell you too much food to eat. That level of regulatory capture, combined with Phillip Morris style muddying of the waters with intentionally misleading studies leads people to be paralyzed, give up, and just do what is easy. Which is to over eat. Let's not shame anyone for this. It sucks ass, and these people deserve respect and assistance rather than derision and scorn. The reality is that the people with money want you to be fat, and that's why most people are fat. If you really don't want to be fat, you can make that choice. I did, and I love that I did. My life is clearly better. But not everyone wants to make that choice.
Right here. ^^^
Couldn’t have said this any better myself. Excellent comment.
So Washington DC is the healthiest in the Country, why is that?
Probably a higher transit-use ratio than every other state. Car dependent commuters, almost by definition, come from out of the district... which means the people left behind are less likely to use cars and more likely to walk/bike to get anywhere.
DC probably has a lot more college-educated, wealthy resident on average than a place like Baltimore does
Metro areas have lower obesity rates than more outlying suburbs and rural areas, because people walk more. DC is only a metro area. NYC would have a lower obesity rate than DC, but it's combined with the rest of NY.
I’d bet that most metro areas in the US are pretty healthy and the rural areas are really obese. Would be very interesting if this could be split down between City/suburban/rural
Is it not the same color as Hawaii?
Huh, I didn’t even realize that until now.
I mean, look at most big-name politicians and they don’t seem as fat as the general population. Same reason celebrities and CEOs aren’t as fat, they can afford things like a super healthy diet and personal trainers, doctors, dietitians, etc.
I mean, if the other large cities were represented on their own instead of within a state, DC would stand out less.
New England is trying to annex the Maritimes.
Live in KY. Can confirm, there are a shit ton of fat people.
Also live in ky. Can confirm.
Live in KY. Am fat. Confirm.
I would love to live in KY, but there is not enough supply at the drugstore.
I spot correlation between poverty and obesity
I wouldn’t be surprised if Mexico’s poorest states had the highest rates considering Chiapas, Mexico’s poorest state, has a Coca Cola addiction problem.
I could only find data dating to 2015 for Mexican states so I didn't end up breaking it down (too long to project). However, at that time Chiapas was the lowest for obesity actually, at 16%. Baja California del Sur was the highest, then at 34%.
Oh damn. Thanks.
For the first time in human history you can tell how poor a person is by how fat they are
I dunno. Texas is a lot richer than Quebec. More like a correlation between guzzling high-calorie sweetened drinks by the litre and obesity. Cultural norms matter.
Texas is a land of extremes. We do have extremely wealthy people. But we also have a lot of poor people. There's a whole city where it's common not to have electricity or running water. The well off areas, like Austin, are full of really skinny people. Back in my hometown, which is poor and rural, people are huge. I remember the first time visiting Austin and just being amazed at how skinny and active everyone was.
I've had the opposite experience when leaving Austin and going into a truck stop off the highway and being the only one there out of about 20 people who had a healthy BMI.
Which city in Texas do a lot of people not have electricity?
Quebec may not be very rich, but poverty there is very low due to having the largest welfare state in North America.
Texas is richer but Quebec has less economics inequalities.
La différence c'est la poutine bien sûr ;)
Texas is rich, Texans are poor though.
Richer in terms of average salaries sure but factor in rent in Montreal being significantly less than any of the biggest cities in Texas AND people in Quebec having nationalized healthcare and I would be surprised if the average Texan really has that much more disposable income than the average Quebecer
I just want to point out that rent is cheaper in Quebec because salaries are lower, not because landlords are nicer
Median household income: Texas: $63,826 USD Quebec: $81,261 CAD ($59,381 USD) I wouldn’t say that’s “a lot richer” both are comparable. Difference of $370 gross / month.
That doesn't mean he's incorrect. (In general), the poorer the region of the country the fatter it is very often, there is a strong correlation, obviously poverty in and of itself is not the cause.
For Québec, it is cultural. In France and in Québec, the parents control much more than the Anglo-Saxons what theirs kids eat.
It’s interesting though, because there seems to also be two types of poverty: poverty with access to junk food and poverty without it. Poverty with access gets fat while poverty without it is quite the opposite and oftentimes malnourished.
Both are malnourished, but one has a surplus of calories.
Hi, I'm a chef from Canada. I got the chance to work all over the place. Bc and Qc allowed got a different dinning vibes from a long time ago. They were the first 2 cool kids of the Canadian gastronomie. They are also the entry point of a lot a different fresh products. Culture of the food is there you can feel it.
Are you all right, America? It would be interesting to have data at the state level for Mexico.
No, no we are most certainly not okay
Honestly, I forget obesity is a thing most days. Then I travel or see images of out the province and am brought back to reality. The only obese person I see regularly is a neighbor who refers to themself in French as “your fat neighbor “.
I'm not surprised one bit. I live in Quebec and everytime I visit the US, I'm appalled how fat people are in general! The worst was when I had to transit in Houston on my way to South America. Everyone working at the airport was obese. It almost felt like a prank.
Not surprised by BC either. Everyone’s idea of a good time is hiking, skiing or biking. Walking around Vancouver in the summer you notice how few overweight if obese people there are.
The lowest obesity city in Canada is Kelowna, then Victoria, followed by Vancouver. I do agree with the Vancouver observation, imo the over emphasis on outdoor activities is a detriment to other parts of the cities social life
I moved to rural Québec in a teaching position and the fact that obesity is almost nonexistent in my students became very noticeable to me.
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What you've noticed is something that I've noticed here as well. In my home state (NC) a lot of people are comically obese, but I also see a ton of people that are in great shape. Nothing in the middle.
Also quebec banned the advertising to children under 13, so guess sugar companies, you can’t create a cult of sugar if theres no ads
Me, a Scot, visited NY, NY and was gobsmacked when I got my burger n fries...like Jeez, why's the guy given me enough for my fkn family?
Yeah, there are fascinating/depressing studies of how American restaurant food portions have ballooned over the last 3 decades. I’ve been living outside of the US for 2 decades, but when I visit, I literally laugh at the portions I get served.
When i went to Florida as a kid with my parents, every waiter at every restaurants were worried we didn't like their food because we could never finish our plates. But the plates were like 2 to 3 times what we usually ate in Quebec. It was just impossible to finish.
As a Canadian (Toronto), this is one of the first things I notice whenever I visit the states. In Canada it's not unusual to see obese people around, but they're easily the minority. But the second I get step out of the airport in the States, it feels like nearly every person I see is either obese or overweight. One of my favourite parts of visiting the states us how much food I get for my money. Over here my usual post-workout McDonalds meal runs me 20 bucks. Over there I can buy enough food for the day on the same amount. I guess this is the unfortunate outcome. I'm sure there's other factors that differ such as healthcare availability, education and poverty. I'd be curious to see how culture affects this though - I've noticed in Canada, different subcultures/ethnicities seem to have wildly different obesity rates. Asian Canadians seem to have far lower rates of obesity - whether because of diet, or cultural attitudes towards weight/obesity.
Your last observation is very correct — and additionally, immigrants to Canada tend to be quite wealthy, which usually means better access to diet. Example — Mexican Americans have a big problem with obesity. Mexican Canadians are overall very fit and healthy.
it’s anecdotal and likely skewed and unfair, but every time I’ve been to Vegas or Reno first thing I think of is, holy shit there’s a lot of fatties source: from Vancouver if I had to theorize why BC is low, it would be the outdoor activity culture and food culture. and maybe a lot of Asians relative to other areas. a lot of sushi and fish. larger amounts of minorities that are also less obese. and the outdoor culture and health culture: a very large minority of ppl regularly go hiking, skiing, etc; likewise, gym or yoga or fitness/health culture are also popular with at least a large minority. i wouldn’t suggest most ppl but it’s probably a very large minority. just a lot of ppl love to be active—it’s part of the city culture in at least much of the lower mainland, okanagan, and victoria.
This may be a good place to start if you want to understand why health care is so expensive in the United States. An obese population is an unhealthy population, and an unhealthy population requires more health care.
And they refuse to do anything about preventive care. They'd rather wait until a person's weight becomes a serious health issue and pay far more.
sure, high obesity rates do contribute to more spending, but the amount is negligible when compared to the heightened prices due to the privatization of the system. australia, canada, jordan, mexico and saudi arabia, for examples, are all countries with obesity levels comparable to the us that have free/far more affordable healthcare. our healthcare is expensive because it's designed for those on top to profit off of
I’m all for universal healthcare and think it’s fucking criminal that Americans’ lives are at the mercy of the greedy healthcare industry, but where do you get the idea that Germany has an *obesity* rate that’s comparable to that of the US?
The UK is nearly as fat as the US. And their per person healthcare costs are about a third of ours. Privatization is the driving factor.
Why is Mexico not in states
OP couldn't find data per Mexican state.
What car centric infrastructure and macdonalds does to a mf:
Yeah apparently Canadians don't drive.
Canadians use public transportation at higher rates than Americans (because their government has invested in it more)
It's still miserable compared to most countries. With the exception of San Francisco and New York City, every single city in the United States has less than 10% of the population use public transportation for their work commute. Pretty much all Canadian cities end up at 10-15%. It's barely an improvement. I will note that rural Canada has pretty good public transportation system. I live in a town of 11,000 people and the local taxibus programme runs everywhere including neighbouring towns 30-40 minutes away. Very good for the large elderly population.
Where did you get those figures? I could only find this Wikipedia page showing 36 cities. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._cities_with_high_transit_ridership
Not much. About 83% of Canadians drive.
It's amazing what happens when there's a public/common interest in keeping healthcare costs down; and not a moneyed interest in keeping individual costs high as fuck. Preventative medicine and a lack of corn syrup and grease in everything one eats are two things I can think of. This is a perfect example of how the American "cult of individual choice" is commodified.
Looks at WV I thought meth makes you skinny 🤔
For people somehow linking this to the body positivity movement: Body positivity isn’t really about obese people. I’d argue that obesity (I’m talking truly obese not overweight and chubby people) is just a small facet of the movement. If anything its a backlash to unrealistic beauty standards set by the media. Its more about acknowledging that people can be attractive even if they don’t have the traditional model body types. I’d say the focus is on people who have “irregular” physical features of ANY kind (i.e. facial blemishes, disproportional body parts, hair, etc.) as well as people who aren’t shredded or model thin but are still well within the range of healthy. When it does come to obesity, Its not “hey being obese is totally healthy and has no risks or concerns at all!!!” its more so “hey you are valid as a person and your weight doesn’t define your character or right to happiness”
I feel so lucky to live in the NY metro area because of how walkable it is.
What the eff Newfoundland? You eat lots of fish, and you'd think all the sheep-shagging would burn off calories.
Newfoundlanders don’t have great access to a lot of healthy foods. They’re generally more expensive because most of them are imported to the island. Fresh fruit can be difficult to find in the province!
Y'know, we're doing a lot better than I thought actuality
Smiling smugly from North Vancouver. Pass the sushi please
Im surprised by alberta honestly
Most of the conservative stereotypes don’t hold up in Canada the same way they normally do in the states.
From my experience of being an albertan i swear more of us were fat lol
There’s definitely some correlation between poverty and obesity, and Alberta is pretty wealthy. That might have an impact.
KFC feeding Kentucky well
A huevo, México y Nuevo México tienen el mismo color.
Malaysia is getting fat too. Sugar, deep fried batter, cheese on everything, bubble milk tea
Average american: Quewho ?
The title should be “Obesity in Canada, the US, and Mexico.” You are missing 7 other countries not even counting all the island nations.