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the relationship between genetics and obesity
essay on genes affecting obesity
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Obesity: A Growing Plague In the year 2010, the documentary Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead was released. In the film, Australian native Joe Cross has realized that his health is worsening very fast. So Cross finally decides that he will turn his life around by taking an extreme diet that will deprive him of macronutrients for 60 days. Macronutrients are nutrients found in foods other than fruits and vegetables. Micronutrients are those nutrients found in fruits and vegetables. Micronutrients provide minerals such as Vitamin A, Iodine, Iron, Folate, and Zinc. While the body does not need these in large amounts, they are essential to the body because they help develop disease prevention and promote well-being. Micronutrients are important to include …show more content…
This relates directly to the first reason and is the cause of it. People can talk about how low-income and obesity goes hand in hand, but the greater root cause of this is education or rather the lack thereof. The first examination is upon children with parents who did not complete high school. A study by the National Survey of Children’s Health found that children with parents that didn’t finish high school had a 30% greater chance of developing obesity than children with parents that had a college degree. The National Center for Health Statistics also shows an interesting stat that supports the claim of education and obesity. From the ages of 25 to 54, the largest percentage of obese individuals were those who do not have a high school diploma. The only age bracket that was different was 55-64 where the largest group was those without any college education. These two groups of education levels, however, make up 75% to 85% of obese individuals in all age brackets. By observing this, one can deduct that education does have a relationship with obesity. By receiving a better education, one can get a better job and live in a good neighborhood and from there live a healthy …show more content…
However, an article from the Medical School at Harvard University disagrees. This paper says that there have been mutations in genes that make humans more susceptible to obesity and increase fat levels. Yet, the author of the article said that even though these genes are hereditary, that doesn’t mean their destiny. The article clearly states that obesity is 100% preventable by living a healthy lifestyle. This invalidates the argument that obesity is a genetic disorder. Genetic disorders are often untreatable, so to argue obesity as one is
Although inherited conditions have been linked to childhood obesity, they are rare. However it has been noted that children with obese or overweight parents are more than likely to be obese themselves, the reason for this as described by Heaton-Harris (2007) is because of the length of time it takes to break a bad habit. Unless the parents are correctly informed of healthy diets themselves the problem will continue from an ill-informed childhood into adult hood. Other probable causes are numerous ones. Fast food and processed foods becoming more read...
About 2.8 billion adults every year die of obesity (Diet). Rachel Epstein wrote the book “Eating Habits and Disorders” which talks about obesity being a disease. Obesity is a condition with extra body fat which often starts to form in childhood (Epstein 25). While obesity for some adults can be life-threatening (Epstein 25). It can also form psychosocial problems (Epstein 25). Being obese causes a risk in diabetes, heart disease, arthritis, kidney trouble and more (Epstein 25). Being obese during pregnancy can cause many problems for the mom, and for the baby (Epstein 25). Any of these things could cause many problems either in the future, or in the present (Epstein 25). The worse the eating habits, the harder it is to cure (Epstein 25). The government needs to do more about obesity because obesity rates are rising, many kids are being victims of obesity and they don’t even know it, also Medical Care is taking a big part with the growing obesity rates.
Today, as many as 10 out of 100 young teens struggle with an eating disorder. Each year, many teens develop eating disorders, or problems related to their weight, body image, and food. Anorexia is a serious eating disorder associated with an intense fear of weight gain and food. People who suffer from anorexia limit the amount of food they eat and have a distorted view of their body size and shape and may become dangerously thin. That is because the disorder affects not only their body but also their mind. Although the cause of anorexia is not fully understood, there is evidence that physical, biological, and social triggers are part of problems in anorexia. All of these causes revolve around the society we are living in today.
intro- Ninety percent of teenage girls have been on a diet. Some take it too far and starve themselves to be thin. Over one million people in just the US are afflicted with anorexia. If what is on the inside matters, then why are does society and the media constantly promote being thin? The influence of society’s promotion of a thin body plays a significant role in the development of such eating disorders as anorexia.
Anorexia nervosa is a disorder typically shown in the media as a teenage girl whose bones show through her skin, picking and prodding at her body in the mirror. This is the image that comes to mind for most people when they think of anorexia. However, this image only scratches the surface of a disorder as complex as anorexia. Anorexia can be understood by looking at a few different things: its definition, its causes and prevalence, its resulting complications, and its treatment.
Anorexia has many negative effects as well. According to the University of Maryland Medical Centers article Eating Disorders, “Anorexia nervosa can increase the risk for serious health problems such as: hormonal changes including reproductive, thyroid, stress, and growth hormones, heart problems such as abnormal heart rhythm, electrolyte imbalance, fertility problems, bone density loss, anemia, and neurological problems.” Anorexia can severely affect a person internally. The continuous lack of nutrients can leave an anorexic person extremely frail. The heart in particular can grow so weak, that heart failure occurs. Eating disorders can lead too permanent health damages can stay with a person for the rest of their life.
Obesity stems from a variety problems. The three main causes of obesity are behavior, genetics, and environment. Being in an environment where people have the luxury of driving up to a drive through window and get their food prepared in five minutes is very convenient and inexpensive. Making these poor food choices accompanied by a sedentary lifestyle is definitely a way to become and stay obese. On the other hand, genetics also play a role in obesity. A person could inherit a gene which causes a trait for obesity. Obese relatives could provide a clue that one’s family carries that trait, although it is not dispositive. Genetics determines how much fat one’s body stores and distributes. It also determines how effective one’s body is in converting food into energy and how many calories a person can burn during exercise.
Obesity is a label given to individuals who have a body mass index (BMI) of above 30. Any individual male or female is considered to be morbidly obese if the BMI was above 40 (NHS, 2012). Being obese for a period of time can increase the risk of obesity related diseases including diabetes, heart disease and certain types of cancers (colon cancer, bowel or breast cancer) and even a greater risk of strokes (NHS, 2012). The World Health Organisation (Who) (2013) states that obesity can have a range of long term issues on the body and its organs which can cause preventable illnesses and diseases. Specifically being obese can affect the respiratory (breathing) system. Weight can put people at a greater risk of asthma, sleep apnoea, pneumonia. Furthermore obesity can cause reproductive issues for both male and females ranging from menstrual disturbances, hormonal imbalances and erectile dysfunction and in certain extreme cases having fertility issues leading to potential infertility. There were suggestions in the past that obesity is a genetic issue, however it has been established since then that the human genome with evidence from single gene mutation in lab based experiments have identified a substantial link between genetic risks of obesity, furthermore it was established that obesity is the result of a complex pathophysiological pathway involving many factors that may control adipose tissue metabolism (Knott, 2013). In (2007) The Department of Health published a report stating that there were fears that by 2050 almost 90% of adults would be categorised at obese.
Literature Review: There is ongoing research in the search to discover if obesity is the result of genetics or merely lack of physical exercise and poor eating habits. A peer-reviewed article by A Li and D Meyre entitled, Challenges in Reproducibility of Genetic Association Studies: Lessons learned from the Obesity Field, mentions that genetics does have a substantial role in obesity, but since scientists cannot reproduce the gene and prove that it is true, they cannot guarantee that genetics is a result of obesity (Li & Meyre, 2012). A similar reviewed article by David U. Gorkin and Bing Ren, states that there are 75 locations on the human DNA sequence that relates to obesity, but in this research direct evidence is still lacking (Gorkin, D & Ren, B, 2014).
According to an article in Oxford Journals, “There is substantial evidence for the hereditability of obesity, and research in both rare and common forms of obesity has identified genes with significant roles in its etiology” (Genetics…).
“As early as in 2007 researchers identified the first 'obesity gene' known as the FTO gene (Fat mass and obesity-associated protein) but after having studied the FTO genes for six years, they are still not sure how this gene variant affects obesity. They do, however, know that people with FTO have an increased risk of obesity.” (Sjorgen, 2013) In the research conducted by the Institute of Preventive Medicine at Fredricksberg Hospital researchers found that when one of the components of DNA ( adenine, guanine, cytosine, and thymine) has been replaced by another it causes the gene to behave differently. This causes the predisposition for the gene of obesity. These researchers believe the solution to genetic obesity will be found within the next ten years.
Macronutrients and micronutrients are both very important for the human body. Macronutrients are the nutrients that the body needs in larger amounts, while micronutrients are not required in large amounts but a steady supply is necessary for proper functioning in the body system. Macronutrients give energy to our bodies that we need to grow properly and metabolize our food as well as function in other ways. Macronutrients consist of carbohydrates, proteins and fats. Micronutrients are the different types of vitamins and minerals needed by the
Obesity is a physiological condition characterised by an excessive accumulation of body fat, specifically the build-up of adipose tissue beneath the skin. In recent years, the number of people diagnosed with clinical obesity has increased dramatically, with governments desperately trying to tackle the obesity epidemic and its associated consequences (McLannahan and Clifton, 2008). Studies have found that the prevalence of obesity once stood at an estimated 9.8% (Kelly, Yang, Chen, Reynolds & He, 2008), a considerable figure representing almost 400 million individuals worldwide. Even though obesity has now been recognised as a major problem the number of people affected is increasing rapidly, with almost 300,000 deaths attributable to obesity in the USA each year (Allison, Fontaine, Manson, Stevens, & VanItallie, 1999). Excessive amounts of fat can prove dangerous as the condition has a very high comorbidity rate with other long term health issues such as diabetes, cardiovascular disease, hypertension and cancer (Pi-Sunyer, 1993). Numerous examples of media, medical journals and educational literature concerning obesity refer to the condition as a disease, with an increasing use of the word ‘Epidemic’ to describe the somewhat recent surge of obesity cases in western societies (Boero, 2007), however there is little material available that offers evidence for obesity meeting specification for disease. Instead it has been proposed that obesity is alternatively a risk factor for developing other potentially harmful diseases, influenced by a variety of other factors i.e. genetics, cultural ideals and biological impairments.
There are many factors that play a role in obesity but one of the main possible causes is that it can be genetically inherited. There have been many studies done to see if obesity is hereditary. By using twin studies, the investigators found that the chance of obesity being inherited is between 70 and 80 percent (Friedman). They also found that twins who are adopted resemble the weight of their biological parents more than their parents who’ve adopted
Obesity is a common condition that affects thousands around the world. Its causes may vary from simply eating too much to not getting the exercise needed to attempting to quit smoking. Treatment of this condition may be as simple as getting the right diet or exercise, or a planned schedule from one’s physician. Obesity may be heredity or may be a result of any of the above mentioned causes. It is a serious matter to be dealt with yet may be treated easily.