Submitted by Taps Coogan on the 14th of February 2018 to The Sounding Line.

The CDC released a report in late 2017 which concluded that, for the first time since the 1960s, US life expectancy fell in both 2015 and 2016. While the primary cause of the decrease in US life expectancy is surging drug overdose deaths, an issue we have discussed several times here at The Sounding Line, the decrease is also being caused by soaring obesity rates and associated health problems. Time Magazine has estimated that rising obesity rates have caused the average US life expectancy to be nearly one year lower than it would otherwise have been between 1988 and 2011 and had resulted in “as many as 186,000 additional deaths in 2011 alone.”

Obesity is a global problem:

The US is hardly the only country suffering from rising obesity rates. In fact, as Metrocosm notes:

“Without exception, obesity rates have risen in every country around the world”

“At the low end is North Korea, where obesity rates are up about one percentage point (from 1.6% in 1975 to 2.8% today). Japan is also near the bottom with a mere two point increase since 1975 (from 1.1% to 3.3%).”

“The largest changes occurred in smaller Pacific Island countries. Samoa, Tonga, and Tuvalu all saw their obesity rates increase by more than 20 percentage points, a doubling of what they were in 1975.”

“That country that struck me most of all was China. In 1975, only 0.5% of Chinese adults were obese. Today, China’s obesity rate is about 8%. At China’s current population, the difference amounts to over 100 million people.”

The following video map, from Metrocosm, shows in detail how obesity rates have risen around the world to today’s dangerous levels.

To see other interesting historical maps check out:
The History of the Greeks
Every Year of the Roman Empire
Every Other Day of the Napoleonic Wars
Every Day of World War I
Every Day of World War II
The History of the World Every Year
The Five Largest Cities Throughout History
Every Major Plague Epidemic in History
The Evolution of Modern Government
The Rise of Religions Throughout History
The History of Communism Since 1850
The History of Urbanization
The History of South America

P.S. We have added email distribution for The Sounding Line. If you would like to be updated via email when we post a new article, please click here. It’s free and we won’t send any promotional materials.