Fit and Fat?
Reported September 27, 2007
NEW HAVEN, Conn. (Ivanhoe Broadcast News) — There’s a good chance you’re trying to lose weight. Up to 35 percent of Americans are at any given time, and with experts calling obesity in this country an epidemic, losing weight seems more important than ever before. But can you actually be fat and fit?
At 300 pounds, Lisa Tealer is considered obese. Yet, this aerobics instructor says she’s healthy. “I actually believe that you can be fit and fat,” she says.
Can you really? The question has caused controversy in the wake of an obesity epidemic — where 65 percent of the U.S. population is overweight.
“It’s been proposed that this generation will have a shorter life expectancy than their parents,” says Lisa Tartamella, R.D., from the Yale-New Haven Hospital Shoreline Nutrition Center in New Haven, Conn.
But some experts say you’ll live longer if you’re overweight and active than thin and sedentary.
“Being completely sedentary, you are increasing your risk of cancer, coronary artery disease, diabetes, osteoporosis,” says Paul Frickman, an exercise physiologist from Florida Hospital Diabetes Center in Orlando, Fla.
In one study, unfit men were much more likely to die of heart disease than fit men — regardless of weight. Another showed women who were slender but inactive were 55-percent more likely to die than women who were active and lean. But — being both sedentary and obese raised their risk of dying by more than 100 percent.
The bottom line — there’s no replacement for being active and lean, but even a little exercise helps.
“You will feel better and get those benefits of and, sometimes not the things that you see, but the things that you don’t see, like lowering your blood pressure and lowering your blood sugars,” says Frickman.
People who have excess weight in their abdomen are at especially high risk for obesity-related health problems. But doctors say losing just 5 percent to 10 percent of your weight can greatly improve your health.
For more information, please contact:
Lisa Tartamella, M.S., R.D.
Yale-New Haven Hospital
Shoreline Center for Nutrition
Physician Referral Hotline
(888) 700-6543