Why
are we so fat despite our best efforts?
When you think about the
causes of overweight and obesity, conditions that now affect the majority of
Americans, two factors likely come to mind immediately: dreadful dietary habits
and lack of exercise. This is what I call the "orthodox wisdom" that
we hear all the time.
But what if I said you
are wrong? Well, at least not 100 percent right.
You're missing a huge influence that has been driving the obesity epidemic for the last half century, and it has nothing to do with a penchant for sitting on the couch eating potato chips and watching television. It has to do with obesogens—chemicals in our environment that promote weight gain.
You're missing a huge influence that has been driving the obesity epidemic for the last half century, and it has nothing to do with a penchant for sitting on the couch eating potato chips and watching television. It has to do with obesogens—chemicals in our environment that promote weight gain.
No one wants to be fat,
but most of us are, despite working hard to eliminate unwanted pounds.
Something is wrong with this narrative.
I coined the term "obesogen" in 2006 to describe chemicals that can make you fat. This sounded the alarm and spurred a flurry of scientific research studying the phenomenon of chemical-induced obesity.
My team found that a chemical we were studying for other reasons had the ability to make mice fat. That started me thinking that there might be an alternative explanation for our irrepressible fatness other than calories in versus calories out.
And I was right.
Take a moment to
consider obesity from a purely logical standpoint: If weight were simply
determined by calories eaten minus calories burned (more formally called the
energy balance equation), don't you think we would be able to more easily
manage our weight? Why can we balance our bank checkbooks, but not our caloric
checkbooks?
In arithmetic, one plus
one equals two no matter what language you speak. But one plus one can equal
more than two when it comes to the weight equation of the human body.
"Alarming"
obesity levels
Epidemiological studies in
humans have revealed strong links between exposure to certain environmental
chemicals and greater body mass index (BMI). The BMI is a general measure that relates
your weight in kilograms to your height.
BMI is often used as an indicator of obesity on one end of the spectrum, and underweight on the other.
BMI is often used as an indicator of obesity on one end of the spectrum, and underweight on the other.
An important 2016 study showed that average BMI today
is higher than it was a little more than a generation ago, even when our
caloric intake and physical activity is about the same.
Put another way, adults
today find it harder to maintain the same weight than did adults 20 to 30 years
ago, even at the same levels of food intake and exercise.
People are about 10
percent heavier today than were people in the 1980s, even if they eat and
exercise as they did back in the heydays of leg warmers and Sony Walkmans. And
despite what you hear, we probably exercise more than we did
in the 1980s—not less.
The time has come to
reveal the untold story of obesogens with the hope that you can take better
control of your waistline, your health, and especially the wellbeing of your
children and future generations. After all, nowhere is the obesity epidemic
more painfully disturbing to witness and acknowledge than in our young.
In January of 2016, the
World Health Organization released a statement declaring that the number of
obese children worldwide today is "alarming".
I will add the words
"disheartening" and "unacceptable."
Beyond eating and
exercise
I don't mean to minimize
poor diet and physical inactivity; these remain leading causes of overweight
and obesity. But we in the scientific community are increasingly finding that
exposure to chemicals in our diet and environment may be an under-recognized
risk factor.
In the last decade,
other researchers and I have identified dozens of chemicals that can increase
susceptibility to becoming obese in animals, and trigger cultured cells to become fat cells.
The narrative about our
obesity epidemic, which is now a severe public health crisis, continues to be
stuck in the conversation about our modern lifestyles—too much food (especially
the wrong kind) and not enough exercise.
When doctors address patients who are overweight, they resort to the same old questions: "How much are you eating? How often do you exercise?"
When doctors address patients who are overweight, they resort to the same old questions: "How much are you eating? How often do you exercise?"
Doctors rarely ask about
what their patients may be exposed to (even unwittingly) in daily life—in their
food, households, workplaces, and even in medicine cabinets. Indeed, many are
hostile to the idea that chemical exposures may have effects on health.
However, there are many
chemicals that you are exposed to on a daily basis (many of which will surprise
you) that are connected to your body weight. Losing weight is no longer only
about putting down the doughnuts and hopping on a treadmill.
Obesogens contribute to
obesity by disrupting the normal development and balance of fat metabolism—how
your body creates and stores fat. Obesogens can reprogram stem cells in the
body to develop into more fat cells. Obesogen exposure also changes how your
body responds to dietary choices and handles calories.
So even though you have
bought into the latest trends—Paleo, low-carb, gluten-free, high-intensity
interval training—you can still struggle mightily with weight because of what
is in your environment (broadly defined).
A heritable health
hazard
One of the most
pernicious ramifications of obesogens is that their effects can be passed on to
future generations. That's right: The effects of obesogen exposure can
be heritable.
The havoc that obesogens
wreak on our bodies can be passed down to our biological children,
grandchildren and beyond. This is why understanding the science of obesogens
and knowing how to avoid them is particularly important for women who intend to
become pregnant, are already pregnant, or who have young children.
The developmental years
are a sensitive period in one's life, during which the body can be more
vulnerable to, and affected by chemical exposures.
Our children,
grandchildren and beyond deserve to have the best possible chance to live long,
healthy and lean lives without being saddled with a predisposition to the
burden of obesity and its related consequences.
Reducing obesogen
exposure in your life is an excellent start.
Bruce Blumberg has been
conducting pioneering research in endocrinology and developmental biology for
more than 30 years. He is professor in the Departments of Developmental and
Cell Biology, Pharmaceutical Sciences, and Biomedical Engineering at UC Irvine.
He is the author of The Obesogen Effect: Why We Eat
Less and Exercise More but Still Struggle to Lose Weight.