Fucoidan Health News March: How Does Being Overweight and Obese Affect Our Health?
How does being overweight and obese affect our health?
The global spread of obesity has been labeled a pandemic. Obesity is defined as abnormal or excessive fat accumulation that increases the workload of organs in the body, leading to various diseases, cancers, and impairing health. This article briefly summarizes the associations between obesity and adult health.
How do you know if you are obese?
The World Health Organization recommends using Body Mass Index (BMI) and waist measurement to measure the degree of obesity. BMI is a person’s weight in kilograms divided by the square of height in meters. The higher the BMI index, the higher the probability of suffering from obesity-related diseases.
🔹BMI < 18.5
Underweight – This can be prone to problems such as malnutrition, osteoporosis, and hair loss.
🔹18.5 ≤ BMI < 24
Healthy weight – Please continue to maintain a healthy lifestyle.
🔹24 ≤ BMI < 27
Overweight – Being overweight greatly affects health, and you need to change your lifestyle.
🔹BMI ≥ 27
Mild obesity – This is mainly caused by stress, irregular diet, and lack of exercise. Doing more exercise can help you lose weight.
🔹BMI ≥ 30
Moderate obesity – Start with diet control; when the weight gradually drops, start exercising.
🔹BMI ≥ 35
Severe obesity – Consult with your doctor to find out the best obesity treatment options, their benefits, and their risks.
Why does obesity increase the chances of diabetes and cancer?
Do you know how many times people with obesity are more likely to develop diabetes than people with normal weight? Research suggests that obese people are up to 80 times more likely to develop type 2 diabetes than those with a BMI of less than 22. Accumulating excess fat in the body causes fat cells to release “pro-inflammatory” chemicals that disrupt the function of insulin responsive cells and their ability to respond to insulin, reducing the body’s sensitivity to insulin. When insulin sensitivity decreases, our body needs to secrete more insulin to lower blood sugar to normal. Excessive insulin promotes the synthesis of insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF-1), which promotes cancer cell proliferation and inhibits cancer cell apoptosis.
Obese people are more likely to develop cancer than people who maintain a healthy weight. Obesity and diabetes together increase the risk
of developing cancer. In addition, being overweight and obese can cause changes in the body that lead to cancer,
long-lasting inflammation and higher-than-normal insulin levels, insulin-like growth factors and sex hormones, increasing the risk of developing cancer. Being overweight or having obesity is linked with a higher risk of getting 13 types of cancer, including breast and bowel cancer (two of the most common types of cancer), pancreatic, esophageal and gallbladder cancer (the hardest of the three to treat), as well as cancer in the uterus and ovaries, kidney, liver and upper stomach, myeloma, meningioma, and thyroid.
In the unfortunate event of cancer, obese people will have more difficulty treating the disease. For example, obesity makes cancer detection difficult: X-rays, fluoroscopies, and PET scans are created by transmitting photons in the patient’s body to create images. In larger patients, the body’s mass lowers the energy of the photons, resulting in blurry images. Obese people face a high risk of anesthesia during surgery. Doctors often have to make larger incisions to see and expose the tumor during surgery, which implies a greater risk of infection and problems with wound healing. These two risks require greater attention if the patient also has diabetes.
How to Avoid Becoming Overweight and Obese?
We all know that obesity has many adverse effects on the body. However, controlling our diet and working out is always easier said than done, and we don’t want the risk of side effects from weight-loss drugs. So, are there easy ways to avoid overweight and obesity?
First of all, we need to understand the causes of obesity. There are three main factors:
Lack of exercise leads to insufficient calorie consumption.
The influence of genetics, certain diseases, or drugs.
We absorb too many calories.
To lose weight healthily, you must move your body and control your diet.
Weight Control Concept:
Weight Maintenance: Calories Intake = Energy Expenditure
Weight Loss: Calories Intake < Energy Expenditure
Gaining Weight: Calories Intake > Energy Expenditure
7 Tips to Help You Lose Weight
◾️ Remember to eat breakfast to maintain energy sources and avoid excessive calorie intake in the afternoon
◾️ Eat until 70% full; avoid desserts after meals
◾️ Avoid big meals and high-calorie foods at night
◾️ Eat more lean meat to supplement protein and increase satiety so that we won’t overeat
◾️ Increase vegetable intake. Vegetables are low in calories and fat and high in fiber. They should account for about 1/2 of each meal
◾️ Avoid refined starches, such as white toast, white rice
◾️ Exercise more to help burn excess calories that you can’t lose by controlling your diet alone
If you already have obesity problems, you can consult a professional medical team for assistance, change your bad habits, eat a balanced diet, keep working out, and maintain a healthy lifestyle to avoid chronic diseases and cancer.
Reference:
https://www.diabetes.co.uk/diabetes-and-obesity.html
https://www.cdc.gov/cancer/obesity/index.htm
https://www.cancerandfucoidan.com/fucoidan-affects-on-a-high-fat-diet-hfd-induced-obesity/
