By Danilynn Welniak/reporter
The truth is that one must exercise and eat less to lose weight, a doctor from the Tom Landry Center at Baylor Hamilton Heart and Vascular Hospital in Dallas told more than 100 attendees on NE Campus Thursday.
Dr. Jenny Adams said people in today’s society easily get triggered into food addiction, but eating healthier can prevent heart problems. Although exercise is a factor in weight loss and staying healthy, she said it is even more important to acknowledge what and how much one eats.
“Fifty to 60 percent of the U.S. population is overweight,” she said. “How long are we going to ignore the facts?”
According to Adams’ graphs, the number of health clubs in the U.S. has dramatically increased since 1976. However, the amount of obesity in the U.S. has also increased.
“Although many would suggest that the pandemic is obesity, I believe that the pandemic is us,” she said.
Adams said that the American society drills exercise into our students’ heads as the only way to lose weight when, in reality, it is necessary to know what each person is eating as well.
“Eighty to 90 percent of the people that hire personal trainers state that their goal is to lose weight,” she said. “But their trainers cannot help them if they do not change their diet as well.”
Adams told the audience to think about this: The proper caloric intake per day is about 2,000 calories. One super-sized Big Mac meal with an apple pie from McDonald’s is 1,600 calories. It takes 16 miles of walking to burn off 1,600 calories.
“It is never OK to splurge,” she said. “One splurge a month equals a gain of 12 pounds a year.”
Adams showed two class pictures of elementary school students. The first was taken recently in color with a total of six overweight children. The second was taken in the ‘70s in black and white with one overweight girl.
“Obesity among our youth is a very serious, growing problem in America,” she said. “It takes six to 20 years to develop diabetes, and the population with diabetes keeps getting younger.”
The problem could be a number of things, Adams said. Contributions to obesity could be fast food, video games, increasing access to soda machines or even the lack of walking trails in or around neighborhoods.
“Addictive drugs, such as cocaine and marijuana, stimulate a part of the brain that craves and needs more of that substance,” she said.
“Like addictive drugs, sugar or certain foods have the same effect on the brain.”
Both addictive drugs and sugar affect the same part of the brain causing a person to crave more every time it is ingested. This is the reason viewers see people that weigh 500 or 600 pounds on TV, she said.
Morgan Smith, a NE Campus student, was excited to learn about how she could help herself and others maintain a healthy lifestyle.
“I always knew that you should exercise, but it was confirmed in my mind today that watching what you eat alone won’t keep the weight off,” she said,
“You do have to do some form of physical activity in addition to watching what you eat in order to stay healthy and lose weight.”
