McDonald's = Like Drug Dealers: Study: Blacks More Fat, Less Fit Than Whites

• Too many Fast Food Stores in the Hood [more]

A person's race may affect his or her -- but especially his -- obesity and fitness levels, claims a new study in the December issue of Chest. After evaluating 5,069 people referred for an exercise stress test to detect coronary artery disease, Dr. Carl J. Lavie, director of the exercise laboratories at the Ochsner Clinic Foundation in New Orleans, and his colleagues found black patients overall had a higher level of obesity and a lower exercise capacity than white patients. The most pronounced differences, Lavie said, were seen in men. Lavie said some doctors and consumers perceive blacks as more fit than other races, possibly because of some black athletes' high profiles in professional sports. His study, however, refutes that perception. The participants included 4,428 whites and 641 blacks, aged 52 to 74. They were evaluated for exercise capacity in simple terms, Lavie said, such as how long they could walk on an incline on a treadmill. Black men, on average, were three years younger than their white counterparts, had a higher body mass index (BMI), and had an exercise capacity that was 7 percent lower, Lavie said. [more]

• Mexican-American and African-American children are twice as likely as non-Hispanic white children to have a body mass index of more than 25, the definition of overweight. [more]
  
• One in every three children born in the year 2000 will develop diabetes in their lifetime
• Left unabated, obesity will surpass smoking as the leading cause of preventable death in America
• Each day, 1 in 4 Americans visits a fast food restaurant
• In 1972, Americans spent 3 billion a year on fast food - today we spend more than 110 billion
• McDonald's represents 43% of total U.S. fast food market
• McDonald's feeds more than 46 million people a day - more than the entire population of Spain
• Only seven items on McDonald's entire menu contain no sugar
• You would have to walk for seven hours straight to burn off a Super Sized Coke, fry and Big Mac
• Before most children can speak they can recognize McDonald's
• McDonald's distributes more toys per year than Toys-R-Us [more]
  
• African American teens watch 40 percent more primetime TV and nearly twice as much daytime TV as other teens. [more]
  

"If we are right now putting drug dealers into jail for their role in the promotion of drug culture in our cities and suburbs, then why aren't we putting crap-food makers like McDonalds into jail for their role in the promotion of obesity?" [more]