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Overweight in the Netherlands. We are getting heavier. Whether it’s overweight, obesity, or morbid obesity; the number of cases in the Netherlands is increasing. And the end is far from in sight.
Overweight in the Netherlands, a lost battle.
We may have lost the battle, but won the war
Well, we seem to have lost more battles in the fight against obesity. Moreover, much more is needed than the current effort to hope to win the war someday.
Today, Statistics Netherlands (CBS) and the National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM) came up with figures about people aged 20 and over that are not particularly hopeful*:
- Since the 1980s, we have increased from almost 0 to 100,000 people with overweight in the most severe class of obesity, morbid obesity (class III).
- The total number of people with overweight in the Netherlands (all classes) has increased from 33% to 50%.
- The number of people with overweight (class I) increased from 4% to 11%.
- One in five Dutch people aged 65 to 75 is obese.
You could almost get discouraged.
Obesity was more common among women than among men, both in total and per class.
*class I, overweight = BMI 30-35, class II, obesity = BMI 35-40, class III, ‘morbid obesity’ =BMI equal to or greater than 40.
Overweight in the Netherlands after 50 years of fitness trends
The cause? Yes, we eat too much and move too little. But we’ve known that for decades, of course. The difference between what your body gets and uses seems to be increasingly out of balance in a growing group. Despite countless diet books, blogs, and gurus, hundreds of fitness machines that you can shove under your bed, and monthly new fitness trends.
These kinds of figures are important because physical activity and a healthy diet are too often seen as purely personal responsibility. It’s easy to say that some just have no moderation when it comes to eating, or are too lazy to move. If half the population is seen as a ‘glutton’ or ‘lazy’, then apparently you expect too much from that personal responsibility.
How realistic is it to think that you solve this problem with a food pyramid and the tip to exercise half an hour every day?
Knowing…
These kinds of figures are therefore important to show that physical education should not be another word for a gym class.
We haven’t changed.
The world around us has changed and our body and brains still operate with an old mindset. A mindset that is not calculated for the amount and type of food that we have at our disposal nowadays. ‘Physical education’ should therefore not be a name for an hour of dodgeball. Physical education should stand for the way we consider knowledge about nutrition and exercise as a serious part of education.
There’s no good reason not to know how much you should eat and exercise. Although I’ve written hundreds of articles on this subject alone, which can sometimes be quite complex, you don’t need to have done lengthy studies to lose weight. With simple guidelines on
daily exercise and nutrition, you can theoretically go a long way. And even those guidelines are not really necessary. Eat less and see if you lose weight. If you don’t lose weight, eat less. Exercise more and see if you lose weight. If you don’t lose weight, exercise more.
It’s not exactly rocket science.
In theory.
But then there’s still a whole world of knowledge out there that can help you achieve results faster than with this finger-in-the-air method. For example, the simple fact that eating less relatively leads to weight loss faster than exercising more. But of course, also the knowledge about the properties of different types of food and their effects on your body. More knowledge can lead to better results with the same effort.
Whether you look up such knowledge is still your own responsibility. Often, this knowledge is only sought when there is overweight. When a wrong eating pattern has been followed for years that now needs to be unlearned. Something about closing the barn door after the horse has bolted.
Understanding Overweight in the Netherlands
And if you do go looking for information, you’ll find yourself diving deep into a sea of data, ranging from sheer nonsense to very complex scientific papers.
Not everyone is able to extract the correct and relevant information from this. It still surprises me that people I see training vigorously in the gym several times a week know surprisingly little about nutrition and training. The commitment and motivation are apparently there. Either people think that more knowledge will add little, or they don’t know how to find this knowledge.
And Doing…
But that motivation and commitment is obviously lacking in many. Even in a world where Google could name the perfect diet and exercise regimen for your body with a quick search, many people will still be overweight.
As mentioned, we are not programmed to cope with an ‘obesogenic’ environment. An environment where hunger fools you and you have to eat less than what your brain asks for. In several articles, I have described that things like hunger, satiety, metabolism, and even self-control are things that are innate to varying degrees.
‘Simply’ maintaining a healthy weight is therefore a continuous struggle for many against their own feelings.
A Creative Solution to Combat Overweight in the Netherlands
When we talk about the benefits of public transportation, we mainly talk about the effect on the environment and traffic congestion. New research shows that there is a connection between the extent to which public transportation is used and the rate of obesity.
Research from the University of Illinois shows that higher participation in public transportation is associated with a lower percentage of obesity among residents of different areas in the U.S. [1]. The researchers compared and analyzed data from different counties. They found that an increase of 1% in participation was associated with a 0.473% lower presence of obesity. This confirms previous research that saw a decrease of 0.221 percent. Although the strength of the association varies in both studies, it is statistically significant in both cases.
Running for the Bus?
The researchers provide some obvious possible explanations for this.
If you take public transportation to work instead of driving, it often means you have to walk
longer distances. You also never have to worry about your car driving away right in front of you. If we knew the most common reasons why adults sprint, I think “catching the bus” would be at the top of the list. A nice alternative when you want to get in shape. 😉
But even if you don’t have your own transportation as an option, or just. Access to public transportation can make the difference between staying at home or engaging in weekly activities and movement outside the home.
The study was a computer-driven analysis of the availability of medical facilities and transportation in 227 counties in 45 different states in 2001 and 2009. The analysis included factors such as leisure time physical activity, income, health insurance coverage, and public transportation facilities.
For the study, they tried to take into account as many factors as possible that could influence body weight. They did this by measuring over different periods.
“The new work takes a longitudinal approach, meaning that we examined differences between 2001 and 2009, allowing us to better control for factors that could otherwise influence the analysis… For example, factors like weather or physical geography that can influence the obesity rate of a county in both 2001 and 2009 are controlled since their impact is present in both time periods
Douglas M. King, University of Illinois
Personal Effects Unknown
Although the researchers offer possible explanations as described above, the personal effect is unknown. One can only say that in regions where people use public transportation more often, obesity is less common. So it doesn’t necessarily mean that a specific individual has less chance of being overweight by taking the bus or train more often. Also, it did not take into account the fact that since 2009, services like Uber and Lyft have become more prominent.
The data shows, in any case, that investing in public transportation can have positive effects on public health. In this case, by reducing the risk of obesity.
That gives even more reason to complain about the fact that we seem to have the most expensive public transportation in Europe.
Our Solution
Helping you find your physical or mental FIT is our mission. Ok, that sounds rather grandiose, but that’s our mission statement. Find your physical or mental health.
We’ve been contributing for years in the form of knowledge. In the articles on the blog, we try to convey both the basics and the latest scientific insights in an understandable way. But that’s not enough. To really bring knowledge about exercise and nutrition to the people often requires more. A helping hand that looks at your personal situation to see what lifestyle needs to be worked towards and how this can best be achieved. Losing weight often turns out to be a lonely road, as was recently demonstrated again.
However, it doesn’t have to be.
That’s why we’ve also been working on the development of the FITsociety app for a few years, which has recently undergone major improvements. In our opinion, it’s the platform to bring coach and client together. Finding the right coach can be just as difficult as finding the right information. A coach is often still seen as a luxury, or for people who want the figure of a fitness model. In today’s figures, I see confirmation that many more people need such help.
A basic need for a healthy life.
Fortunately, it seems that the government also sees this after advice from the Healthcare Institute and health insurer CZ. A proposal for reimbursed lifestyle coaching only needs to be approved by the House of Representatives. The proposal concerns people “who have a chronic disease such as diabetes or cardiovascular diseases, or who are at risk of developing such conditions”. Overweight is of course seen as a significant risk factor for the development of such conditions.
After referral by a general practitioner, coaching could be followed for 7 months, the costs of which remain outside the deductible.
We naturally hope that body weight will also be discussed where necessary, by and/or through the general practitioner. Something that often doesn’t happen, or too late.
The Solution
But as fantastic as we find ourselves, our app, and the coaches in it, we must acknowledge that even if we could help everyone get a professional coach at no cost, the problem would still not be solved. At most, we would be much more successful in fighting a symptom. After all, we’re not changing the fact that there is a mismatch between the settings of our bodies and the influence of our environment.
The real final solution is a bit scary. Reducing that mismatch cannot be done without drastic measures. This can be done, for example, by changing the environment and considering unhealthy food as tobacco, for example. We’re partly already doing that. Like Aldi announced this week that it will stop selling energy drinks to under 14s. Now it’s mostly voluntary actions where marketing probably expects the good gesture to compensate for declining sales. Or they offer a ‘healthier alternative’ like the McDonald’s and Coca Cola’s of this world with light products and salads. However, these are drops in the ocean.
Truly turning off the heat under that plate completely is impossible. I won’t be the only one demonstrating on the Malieveld if it were decided to ban all fast food. I don’t see a commission determining for each type of food whether it contains the right ratio of calories to nutrients either. Phasing out smoking as a right is one thing, but a Big Mac? Moreover, you can also get fat on grandma’s mashed potatoes. After all, overweight is also determined by the amount of food and not just the type. So back to food vouchers?
I personally seek the real solution on the other side; adjusting our
bodies to the environment in which we live. That this environment changes so much faster than our bodies can adapt has always been the reason for our resilience as a species. We are intelligent and creative enough to shape the environment in such a way that we are the most likely to survive in it. This means that our bodies have to change again. We’re already doing that a bit, by exercising more. But what if we put more energy into genetically adapting ourselves to the current environment?
After all, we’re not the only species that can be a good example for this. The genetics of plants and animals are also regularly adapted to meet new environmental conditions. Why not for humans?
I imagine the same ethical discussion as with genetic modification in agriculture. But I think the argument for changing ourselves is even stronger. The implications are even greater. After all, as long as the environmental conditions remain the same, changes in humans are hereditary. And if the environment changes again, we’ll have to do it again.
So this is a can of worms that I’m not going to open any further today. But the time when this becomes a serious discussion seems to be getting closer. Especially with the use of techniques like CRISPR-Cas9 that have brought such changes within reach. Now that I’ve put it like that, it seems like a more serious discussion might be needed sooner than we think. Let me know if you would like to know more about this subject.
And you can find it via the FITsociety app
