As November is U.S. National Diabetes Awareness Month and obesity is apparently costing the health care system $147 billion each year, the personal-finance website WalletHub has released a report on 2021’s Most Overweight & Obese States in America.
The term obese describes a person who’s very overweight, with a lot of body fat. Adults are generally considered obese if they have a body mass index of 30 or above. Obesity is believed to account for 80-85 percent of the risk of developing type 2 diabetes.
The issue is of significant concern in the U.S. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the U.S. obesity prevalence was 42.4 percent between 2017 – 2018. From 1999 –2000 through 2017 –2018, US obesity prevalence was far lower at 30.5 percent. This different shows the extent of the more recent increases.
To determine which U.S. states contribute the most to America’s overweight and obesity problem, WalletHub compared the 50 states and the District of Columbia across 31 key metrics. They range from share of overweight and obese population to sugary-beverage consumption among adolescents to obesity-related health care costs.
The top ten most overweight states were found to be:
| 1. West Virginia |
| 2. Mississippi |
| 3. Arkansas |
| 4. Kentucky |
| 5. Alabama |
| 6. Tennessee |
| 7. Delaware |
| 8. Louisiana |
| 9. South Carolina |
| 10. Oklahoma |
The next ten were: Texas, Ohio, Georgia, Missouri, Kansas, Iowa, North Carolina, Michigan, Indiana, and Maryland. Generally, these are the less prosperous sates within the U.S. suggesting a correlation between higher obesity rates and relative poverty.
Behind the headline numbers there are some interesting variations. Colorado and Massachusetts have the lowest percentage of obese adults, at 24 percent. This is 1.7 times lower than in Mississippi, the state with the highest at 40 percent.
On a different measure, Utah has the lowest percentage of physically inactive adults, 16 percent, which is 1.8 times lower than in Kentucky, the state with the highest at 29 percent.
Looking at two health metrics, Colorado has the lowest percentage of diabetic adults, 7.50 percent, which is 2.1 times lower than in West Virginia, the state with the highest at 15.70 percent. Furthermore, Colorado has the lowest percentage of adults with high blood pressure, 24.50 percent, which is 1.7 times lower than in Mississippi, the state with the highest, at 40.60 percent.
