The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Broadcast Health Series
Aug 28, 2007
Adult obesity rates rose in 31 states last year, according to F as in Fat: How Obesity Policies are Failing in America, 2007, the fourth annual report on obesity from the Trust for America's Health (TFAH). Twenty-two states experienced an increase for the second year in a row, and no state experienced a decrease. Ten of the 15 states with the highest rates of obesity are located in the South.
The report also finds that rates of overweight children (ages 10 to 17) ranged from a high of 22.8 percent in Washington, D.C., to a low of 8.5 percent in Utah. Eight of the 10 states with the highest rates of overweight children were in the South. A new public opinion survey featured in the report finds 85 percent of Americans believe obesity is an epidemic.