Obesity

[NormanH]

I was struck by the  great disparity between the figures for obesity in the UK (Results for 2014 showed that 61.7% of adults were overweight or obese (65.3% of men and 58.1% of women) and France (14,5% de la population adulte. La proportion des personnes obèses est passée de 8.5% à 14,5% entre 1997 et 2009.)

It bears out what I have seen of UK holidaymakers, but since I haven't been there for a long time I  have no first-hand experience.

What are the causes? Ready meals and fast-food? Bad diet full of sugar and fat? Over generous portions?   The sort of greed that makes cooking programmes so popular and in a non-culinary field leads to the obsession with house prices and immigration?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/09/30/restaurants-risk-being-named-and-shamed-in-government-obesity-cr/

[mint]

I don't know about causes but I do watch UK tv (as well as French tv) and I am shocked by the large people I see.  Young people and even professionals, INCLUDING health professionals such as nurses and doctors..........

What is going on???  Like you, I don't go back to the UK, only once for about a week about 9 years ago.

So, certainly, I imagine, ready meals, takeaways, pub lunches (extra HUGE portions) etc, all the things you have already put your finger on.

Also, less active as they do not have the type of weather that encourages outdoor pursuits.

[Chancer]

A big rise in France and interesting that they only release figures 5 years out of date, its an exponential growth curve in the western world so it will be at 20%+ by now.

 

I am a poacher turned gamekeeper, BMI down from 35 to 23, speaking for myself and also from observing the Young families that have rented my UK property I would say its takeaways and alcohol consumption in equal measure plus the quantity of Junk food eaten in the home. The average meal eaten out is usually much more than the daily calory intake for an adult.

 

I read today that Young people in the UK eat on average 2 takeaway meals a day [:-))]

 

When I left 12 years ago I was very overweight and very conscious of it, now I am a healthy weight whenever I am at a gathering of people I am equally conscious because I am the odd one out, most people my age are the size that I was, lord knows what size I would be now but for a heaven sent opportunity that came directly from this forum. I have just got back from a 14k cross country run, and will be out again tomorrow at 8am for a 25km training run, total from Tuesday to Sunday will be 100km. And I have put on 1kg this week [:P]

[nomoss]

[quote user="Chancer"]

A big rise in France and interesting that they only release figures 5 years out of date, its an exponential growth curve in the western world so it will be at 20%+ by now. [/quote]

That's probably as fast as they are able to produce them [6]

Given the rate at which itinerant and fixed fast food outlets, and the popularity of the worst trends from the US, have increased here in the last few years, it will, sadly, be only a short time before France catches up with and even overtakes UK and the US,

Many of the small local restaurants around us have become "pizzerias", mostly offering only takeaways, and at the weekends there are vans flogging low grade cheap hot food in every village.

My weight has stayed between 76 and 80 kg for most of my adult life. I have never made any conscious effort to regulate it, but have just never eaten cr*p.

[YCCMB]

OK, riddle me this, batman.

I have two sons. Both extremely physically active, both with the same parents, both extremely interested in what they eat, to the point of obsession.

Neither would cross the threshold of a fast food outlet, both eat mostly organic food.

One is stick thin, the other (who also studied food science at University) technically obese (He was tested at University as part of his studies).

The "obese" son fulfils all the criteria for obesity, but his fat is healthy fat, his cholesterol is well within healthy limits. He knows more about food (he works in the food industry and is also a qualified chef) than I will ever know. He also doesn't eat excessive quantities.

So, I can vouch for the fact that not everyone who is obese in the UK eats crap, does no exercise, or cares little about what they do to keep healthy.

I fully expect that all of those commenting are prime physical specimens with perfect diets and not an ounce of surplus body fat.

ETA: This report, based on a report in The Lancet, seems to have wildly different figures from those quoted by Norman. In fact, it suggests that there's a much slimmer (pun intended) margin between the UK and France

http://www.francetvinfo.fr/sante/cinq-chiffres-qui-montrent-que-l-obesite-devient-un-gros-probleme_610575.htmly

And this, whilst a couple of years old, from the Grauniad, shows that France is not lagging far behind the UK

https://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2014/may/29/how-obese-is-the-uk-obesity-rates-compare-other-countries

Strikes me that what you've done, Norman, is confuse the uk figures for people who are both overweight AND obese with the French figures purely for those who are obese.

[nomoss]

Maybe the clue is that one of them is a chef[6]

[YCCMB]

But he isn't a chef. He simply has the qualifications to be one.

And as he's been obese since adolescence, his size predates his career.

[NormanH]

This fact sheet does suggest a lower  disparity between the two countries:

https://www.noo.org.uk/securefiles/161001_0626//Adult_InternationalComps_Factsheet_2016_v7%20NB260916.pdf

But the UK remains near the top and France near the bottom.

French men however seem to have a greater problem than the wymyn.

I put it down to British laziness ( ready-meals, fast-food, using supermarkets instead of proper local produce)  and greed,  as seen in portion sizes and wine-glass volumes.

I myself am morbidly obese, but ad-hominem arguments are invalid.

[alittlebitfrench]

I don't think the average French person can afford to be Obese to be fair. Furthermore, I think the French participate in more sports. Certainly at school.

In the UK obesity is probably more a question of excessive alcohol consumption than food consumption. There are plenty more calories alcohol.

[Chancer]

I think that alcohol plays a great part, not necessarily the calories that it contains although guys who drink 10 pints clearly are taking in loads, but that it gives you the munchies, it certainly did with me and 95% of the other drinkers I had known, being inebriated takes away any cognisance of what has already been eaten that day, it makes you crave the worst of foods and if you are outside of the home then high calory Junk food take-aways are all that are available, too available, in fact even for those in the home its only a phone call or a swipe on a phone screen to have the K-rap delivered to your door.

 

OTOH many alcoholics are stick thin living on a purely liquid diet.

 

Looking at other peoples shopping on the tapis roulant has become an obsession of mine since crossing from the dark side, it is very very telling, when I see a very obese family or unruly "expressive" children or stick thin swaying alcoholics one look at what they are buying tells all.

 

Norman, I too am shocked at the size of wine glasses in the UK, in Paris once there was a group of British yummie mummies, they were loud obnoxious, braying and very very drunk, their table was littered with wine bottles, they may not have looked out of place in the UK but they certainly did in Paris, individually and sober they all looked well dressed and groomed, very respectable in fact, it did really shock me hence it sticking in my mind, I had only been out of the UK 7 years and was still a drinker myself then.

[Chancer]

[quote user="alittlebitfrench"]I don't think the average French person can afford to be Obese to be fair. [/quote]

 

In the UK high calory Junk food is far cheaper than cooking from proper fresh ingrédients, in France budget does not stop someone from eating properly but you only have to look at the 80% of a supermarket like Lidl that I ignore, the whole aisles that I just breeze by to see how much cheap crap their is to be had, the chocolates, the cakes, the sugar laden cereals, the viennoiseries, and of course the alcohol.

 

In fact when I spoke about looking at other peoples purchases, I live in a very poor area with huge alcohol and obesity problems, the 80% of the store that does not interest me in the slightest is where the others buy all their purchases [:(] Lidl, Aldi and Netto certainly know what they are doing, they could remove the fruit and veg and dairy sections and get rid of me and maybe 10% of their customers, replace those areas with more K-rap and make a lot more money.

 

The exception is the central arrivage rayons that nobody can resist, that is what brings people into the store in the first place, in fact if you want to buy 3 items from the weekly publicité catalogue you will have to visit the store on 3 different days, each time buying some more Junk food!

[dave21478]

I was over to UK last week for a couple of days and spent the first day on public transport where the number of fatties was significantly higher than I see on the streets of France.

In the supermarkets you can generally tell the state of someones shopping by the overall colour of the packaging.... Mostly reds and oranges for the unhealthy stuff.

Im not one to criticise though, I am a fatty myself and despite having worked as a chef, exist entirely on a diet of valu brand ramen noodles, toast, Pringles crisps and CocaCola, spiced up with a weekly bout of either McDonalds or "chinese" buffet.

Why? I like it.

[Pommier]

I can't comment about the UK as we haven't lived there for 15 years, but over that time in France the number of hugely obese people has increased at a tremendous rate. It's especially noticeable here in summer as there are lots of very fat, French tourists, compared to local people who are perhaps more keen on an active life

[alittlebitfrench]

Here in Paris people tend to be wafer thin. The women especially.

Not many Lidls about which is half the reason !!!!!! and I guess people cook more. But to be fair also, the French don't eat that much either.

I agree Chancer about Lidl. I would not put food sold by them in my mouth. Seriously.....I think smoking is safer.

Shopping at Lidl seems to be an obsession for the British in France. Why is that then ?

[Chancer]

I do all my shopping there, nothing wrong with anything fresh or unprocessed sold there.

 

I live in a village adjoining the main town beside the rocade, the Lidl is a godsend to the bouffers and picoleurs who wobble or stagger in there at 7pm, its always good for entertainment when they start honking at and kicking off against each other far better than the Jeremy Kyle show.

 

The shop will soon be moving to be beside the new Aldi which also relocated from the centre of town to the other end of the rocade beside the Macdo's, very few people live within walking distance of the new Lidl/Aldi/Macdo centre cassociale and most of the current Lidl customers either cannot drive or are banned from driving.

 

I expect the government will intervene and they will now cop for a Motability people carrier, free taxis or a drone fast food and pinard delivery service

[idun]

French women I knew: most I could smell alcohol on their breath after lunch and the headmistress seemed to have had quite a bit.

None would drink in public or very little, and yet, as pretty much a non drinker, I would always smell the stuff and see in their behaviour that they had been drinking. There are many alcoholics in France, it does not have to be obvious to be a sacre problem.

Add to that that most french women I know smoke, they may be sporty, but their clope is part of their eating regime. And one, who used to have something to say about my gaining weight, she was sporty, thin and drank and smoked died young anyway.

 I did put weight on whilst in France.

In fact, I yoyo'd in France, I would put weight on, lose it successfully and then put weight on quicker than I lost it. Fast food? Not on your nelly. I am a good cook, and an experimental cook too, and there is an expression, never trust a thin cook. Chefs etc, my son was one for a number of years, never had time to eat, kitchens are actually too busy. He was hard pushed to ever sit down to a proper meal. Whereas us home cooks, and bakers, well that can be quite different.

Since summer last year I have lost 5 stones, got to grips with what I eat, or rather the quantity I eat it in. No diet for me, because I may never have smoked and have about 12 units of alcohol a year, but I do like some food stuffs, especially baked ones. And that was the problem with any diet, I just went back to the foods I had been deprived of immediately on getting to my target, this time I have deprived myself of nothing just have got to grips with the amounts of those things I like, and I eat them.

I am still classed as overweight and frankly the BMI is a load of rollocks. When young, like 99.5% of those I knew, I was slim and fit. As a family we had no car, walked a lot, had a job where fast walking was essential, if not a jog around the office and with todays BMI  figures, I would have been at the higher end of 'normal' then. As my mother used to say to me, all to often (because she was like that) that I had big bones and I was built like a cart horse........ I wasn't, but I didn't have her menu frame.

In fact the BMI is demoralising as I know it is wrong for most people. Alright if built like my mother was, skinny naturally, but a lot of us are not. So to have targets for those overweight whereby normal will be more or  less unattainable seems tragic to me.

And me, friends are pleading with me to not lose any more weight, I seem to be stable now, and think that I would start to look awful if I did lose more weight. In fact when I was all that weight heavier, everyone used to say I was fine, that it was alright for me, I suppose I must have been lucky enough to not look fat and horrible.

Yes, there are a lot of fat people around, and food is so cheap these days, that it is not a wonder. The way we shop is lousy too, and the waste, well the morals of that I could go on about for hours.

A member of my own family used to automatically throw away anything left from home cooked dinner. They always over cooked, just in case anyone wanted seconds. So there was always food left in pans. When I stayed with them, I would keep it and rustle up a good meal, maybe with a few extras for the following day and they used to say that they were shocked, any yet same family and similarly brought up.

AND ALBF, all the sport at school, really, do they really do good sport at school these days.

I know that some of the stuff that they did when mine were in primary school used to frighten me the way it was done, in fact I tried to check with the education nationale as to who decided what was good for kids, with no success.

So I wrote to Prof at Loughborough University, and got some information. The headmistress, said that it was nonsense (she was literally built like a barrel) and that only the education nationale could decide what was 'good' for children. And like the profs my kids had in college, she never actually moved, just explained what to do. My kids were super sporty especially the youngest and the profs in college doing lessons in their costumes and my son ended up injured twice, because the verbal explanation given to the sportiest kid in the class was insufficient.

I was in France a couple of weeks ago. Yes, far more bigger people than there used to be. I have bouts of seeing big people in England, sometimes I seem to see a lot and then few. I often drive past a primary school in a very poor area, and see the kids out on the field doing sports. These kids would be prime candidates for a rubbish diet and too much fast food and yet, I have yet to see a truly fat kid and only one is a bit plump. The rest are active and look perfectly normal to me. Was I surprised when I first got back, you bet I was. But these years later, same same at this school. (Do they keep fat ones in doors? I have ungraciously wondered, I hope not).

[Chancer]

For the first time ever being a "normal" weight at the upper end of the BMI parametres I should add, I find that I cannot find trousers that fit in most high street stores, I am a 30" waist now and most start at 32 or 34" not that they have many or any of that size on the racks, plenty of 46 and 48" waist ones though. Workwear from Screwfix and Toolstation etc the same, the smallest they do is "M" which are far too large for me, toolbelts just wont do up enough, I think they are made for those plonkers twerking on the moneysupermarket advert [:D]

In Lidl the sports clothing only starts at size L and other than darts players I cant think of any sporting person that would fit in them, mind you the whole "sportswear" market is aimed at posers and not sporting types.

[alittlebitfrench]

@ Idun

The kids do a lot of sports at school.

But like education, sport begins at home or through joining associations which there are many in our part of the world. The kids can learn a vast arrange of sports and activities through clubs and what not. I have never seen that in the UK. Every sport here is countered for.

But again, it comes down location, location, location. Move to some back end rural part of France (like most British expats do with there kids because of cheap housing or some flowery perception that moving to some 'chic' but 'not chic' rural area is a great idea. The reality is the kids will get bored stupid. Certainly when we lived rural there was f-all for the kids to do. That is half the reason we moved.

While I am on the subject, I go cycling with my boy around Paris and it is far far safer than some backwater in France where drivers (most likely pissed) drive like they have no concern for others on the road. Whenever we go holidaying in rural France, the bikes stay at home.

[DerekJ]

That's not my experience of cycling in my bit of rural France (the Lot) which is an absolute joy to ride in especially compared to the UK.  In general I find drivers pretty polite and patient.

[alittlebitfrench]

Well yes compared to the UK. Fair point.

I don't know what is more scary in the UK, other cyclists or car drivers. The UK is a scary place when it comes to cycling.

Personally, I would not take my kid out on a bike on a rural road in France. It is not worth the risk. An adult cycling with experience is fine, a child...no. A city/large town is safer.

[DerekJ]

Funnily enough I feel more nervous of driving in the Lot than cycling. Without digging up all the usual comments about French driving I do find their cavalier attitude to cutting across bends and also their tailgating pretty dangerous.

However, I have only rarely experienced very close passes on the bike and generally they seem to accept they have to wait until a safe opportunity to pass presents itself. Part of this may be that traffic is so, so light there isn't the contention for space on the road. I always find it amazing that I can sometimes ride from our village to Cabrerets and then down to Conduche (about 12 miles) and not have a single car pass me.

I've ridden a few sportives in the area as well (out of Figeac) and these have been so well managed and the atmosphere and cooperation of most drivers so good.

But, like all things, we can only comment on our own experiences and I expect you will have had a different experience. I'm back in the Lot next weekend for a few weeks and hope to get a lot of riding in so hope I don't have reason to change my mind

Oh, just a thought, most times when I have been cut up it has been by Belgian or Dutch registered cars... something you wouldn't expect from such cycling oriented nations.

[idun]

ALBF, my old village has lots of associations and just my famille anglaise, and sport for kids, absolutely loads and my kids did many sports, the youngest excelling at one in particular.

We had soccer, ,tennis, ski clubs for adults and kids, judo, karate along with dance of various sorts and a music association where there were many options. And in the next town, which was not far, there was escrime, archery, rugby, athletics and swimming. 

Sport at school was a joke, and every last assoc was benevole dependant, with very very few paid coaches.

Driving, well, still prefer the UK. I do both, including city, motorway and country driving.

My son was ran off the road on his bike in rural France, someone stopped and picked up out of the ditch, fortunately he didn't lose his teeth, especially as we had just finished paying for the orthodenistry which had taken nearly four years! The dentist took ages picking bits of grass, mud and twigs out of his gums and lips, what a mess,the bike was not in a good condition either. This country road was unfortunately a short cut the soulards took to avoid the gendarmes.

[Chancer]

My local town is a small town yet it has an office du sport and a maison de la jeunesse with at least 3 visible employees in each so probably that many again that manage to avoid contact with the great unwashed, I am looking at their annual booklet, there are 26 pages of sporting associations and that is not counting the commercial entities like the gyms, the swimming pool etc.

 

None of these associations would last 10 minutes in the real competitive world, they are all heavily subventionné'd and completely overadministered, my running club brings in €800 in membership fees and pi55es €2400 up the wall on the annual AGM where people who have probably never run in their lives and who certainly are no longer capable of it pay a €12 annual mebership fee so that they can bring their extended family to the AGM where they will stuff themselves on a buffet fit for a king served by waiters and waitresses formally dressed and drink themselves into oblivion on free champagne, wine, spirits whatever, meanwhile the president and the treasurer etc read out the accounts etc to an audience of one (me) their parole being completely inaudible because of the unsupervised feral "expressive" children running amok.

 

Anyway, rant over, there is no shortage of sporting associations offering very low cost or free sport for all who want to partake which in reality is a tiny minority in many cases outnembered by the people administering the association.

 

Many keep going for décades just to touch the subventions and to have monthly pi55 ups, these usually call themselves "amicales"

 

The town has 4 gymnases, 5 salle de sports spécifiques, 1 salle multi-sports, 6 salles ou terrains divers, 1 terrain multi-sports, 4 stades, 1 aéroclub and club de voile with 2.2km runway (part of the airport) and 1 piscine.

 

[YCCMB]

Funny this thing about clothes sizes and doing sport.

I had a mate who was an Oxford rowing blue. He became a barrister. He had to have his shirts specially made because rowing had made his neck so big.

My eldest son cycles everywhere (and lives in central London) and clocks up about 200km a week. Yes, he's had a few accidents, but as a proportion of the time and distance he cycles I guess it's almost inevitable. He needed a suit recently. His first, at the ripe old age of 29.

He works hard, physically, but is still barely a 30" waist. However, his thighs are so developed from cycling that he fills a suit like Chris Hoy, and needed to buy a much bigger waist size and have the trousers taken in, simply in order to get the thighs to fit him.

Mr Betty weighs somewhere south of 11 stone...whatever that is in Kg. Nonetheless, he finds Aldi work trousers (as in work men's trousers, which he wears for doing DIY at home) fit him and his 30" waist very well. They seem to have plenty in that size when they're available, Chancer. Perhaps you should shop around more.

Oh, and both Mr Betty and son#1, neither of whom have twerked in a Moneysupermarket advert in their lives, would find it nigh on impossible to squeeze into a size smaller then "M" in any of their cycling gear. Only yesterday, Mr Betty availed himself of some very nice cycling gear (size "M") in Aldi. Just like the work trousers, it was readily available in quantity.

And they say reformed smokers get all evangelical.....?

[Daft Doctor]

Hi, just picked up on this thread, which is very interesting. On the difference in obesity rates between the UK and France, that can only be environmental, i.e. a combination of dietary considerations (including alcohol consumption) and attitudes to sport and more minor physical activity, watching TV, etc. In my opinion and experience, the UK is much more aligned to the American way than France, and yes, whenever I go back to the UK I notice how heavy some people are.

That being said, if you took 100 people and fed them exactly the same diet for 6 months, they would all gain (or lose) different amount of weight. Morevoer, even in the 'weight gainers' some would look fat and others wouldn't to the same degree. That is because there is huge variation within individuals in their basal metabolic rates and also to what degree and where they store fat. Although everyone is somewhere on a spectrum in this respect, there are undoubtedly naturally skinny people (ectomorphs) and people who naturally gain weight easily (endomorphs). This is quite probably why the brothers referred to in the post above look very different despite apparently similar attitudes to food and its consumption. Some people tend to put weight on mainly round their middle (very bad prognostically for heart disease and late onset diabetes), whereas others deposit fat more evenly, so look very different. These things are genetic, and if like me you're an endomorph body type, you have to work an awful lot harder to keep your weight under control.

The other thing to say is that in some ways being naturally thin can persuade people falsely that they are healthy, don't need to bother about diet or exercise, and have a low risk of e.g. heart disease. Being naturally thin does not however guarantee that you will have a low cholesterol, as much as being overweight does not necessarily mean that your cholesterol is high. Cholesterol is of course a major risk factor for heart disease, so even the lucky thin people still need to have this checked periodically and watch their diet in the same way that the rest of us should.