Contemporary health issues are a result of the interplay between environmental factors and its influence, and individual genetic composition. As a result, certain people develop health issues depending on the kind of environment they are in or their genetic composition, which can result in the inheritance of certain health issues. Among the health issues that are influenced by both environmental factors and individual genetic composition is obesity. Obesity can be a genetic health issue as well as being influenced by a person’s surrounding environment, thus environment factors, which can encourage an unhealthy lifestyle that can lead to the health issues.
Thesis statement: Nutrition, as well as physical activity, are some of the external, thus environmental factors that influence the contemporary health issue.
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Obesity
Obesity is among the leading contemporary health issues currently challenging the American health sector, which is attributed to contributing towards various causes of deaths including stroke and heart disease. In this day and age, various factors contribute to health issues such as obesity including the kind of lifestyle people are living. This is evident based on the statistical findings, whose report indicates that since the year 2004 to 2014, the cost of care for patients with obesity was estimated at 147 billion dollars (Bray & Bouchard, 2014). Obesity is the second most adverse contemporary health issues that cause the deaths of millions of Americans, thus the need to address the issue, which indeed is a battle that can be won. The manner in which the battle against obesity can be won is through control or reduction of the influencing or contributing factors. These factors are such as; weak or improper nutrition as well as other controllable factors
Nutrition
This refers to the process in which individuals provide or obtain the food needed for health and growth. Nutrition, in a bid to support great or better health, should be well balanced, which means including all the necessary foods for health and growth in one’s diet such as proteins, vitamins, fibers as well as carbohydrates (Geissler & Powers, 2017). Poor or improper nutrition can result in various contemporary health issues including obesity. Some American individuals cannot afford quality healthy meals, which leaves them with food that does not offer good nutrition, thus the prevalence of obesity. Similarly, other Americans have chosen a lifestyle that is constantly characterized by the consumption of high-calorie foods that contribute towards obesity.
Physical Activity
Physical activity refers to engaging in any form of bodily movement as a result of skeletal muscle movement, which requires the use of energy. As a result, to maintain a certain level of health, physical activity is required since it improves blood circulation as well as burning of excess fats and calories. One of the contributing factors of obesity is the lack of physical activity as well as inadequate physical activity as seen among youths (Ekelund et al., 2015).
Important Changes
Some of the significant changes that can be employed in a bid to combat the contemporary issue of obesity are namely:-
Adoption of nutrition practices that promote good health, which entails eating balanced and healthy foods (Anderson et al., 2009) .
Engaging in adequate physical activity that promotes good health (Maples & Houmard, 2014)
An individual can also avoid consuming high risk foods that expose or increase the chances of developing contemporary health issues such as obesity (Anderson et.al, 2009) .
Application to the Field of Public Health
Presently in the United States, there is the provision of valuable resources by the public health foundation, which is employed towards eradicating obesity (Chan & Woo, 2010). An alternative then can also be adopted in the battle against obesity is to educate the masses on the dangers of the same as well as means of avoiding the condition’s development.
Obesity has detrimental implications for the American economy due to its negative implications of raising the number of deaths of productive people as well as the increased cost of the health issue. The government can actively participate in campaigns to promote healthy eating battle obesity. Similarly, the prices of foods that contribute towards or facilitate the development of obesity can be raised to discourage people from consuming such foods.
References
Anderson, L. M., Quinn, T. A., Glanz, K., Ramirez, G., Kahwati, L. C., Johnson, D. B., ... & Katz, D. L. (2009). The effectiveness of worksite nutrition and physical activity interventions for controlling employee overweight and obesity: a systematic review. American journal of preventive medicine , 37 (4), 340-357.
Bray, G. A., & Bouchard, C. (Eds.). (2014). Handbook of Obesity–Volume 2: Clinical Applications (Vol. 2). CRC Press.
Chan, R. S., & Woo, J. (2010). Prevention of overweight and obesity: how effective is the current public health approach. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health , 7 (3), 765-783.
Donatelle, R. (2017). Health: The basics (12th ed.).
Ekelund, U., Ward, H. A., Norat, T., Luan, J. A., May, A. M., Weiderpass, E., ... & Johnsen, N. F. (2015). Physical activity and all-cause mortality across levels of overall and abdominal adiposity in European men and women: the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition Study (EPIC). The American journal of clinical nutrition , 101 (3), 613-621.
Geissler, C., & Powers, H. (Eds.). (2017). Human nutrition . Oxford University Press.
Maples, J. M., & Houmard, J. A. (2014). Physical activity for obesity. In Integrative weight management (pp. 251-260). Springer New York.
