Some Minnesotans might be chortling about a study out today showing Mississippi is the most obese state in the country, but our day will come, Minnesota. You had your chance to lower the obesity rate by 15 percent and — like every state in the union — you missed.
More than a third of the U.S. adults — I'm guessing it's the middle third — are obese, the report says.
Looking at the Centers for Disease Control map on obesity in just the last half decade is like watching the progression of Asian carp and zebra mussels.
According to today's report from Trust for America's Health, Minnesota ranks 38th in obesity, down from about 31st four or five years ago.
The State Fair starts in 10 days. We could go orange by the end of the month.
Look for a similar USA map graphic on adult smoking rates in a new report coming from the American Lung Association on Wednesday.
It's zebra mussels. Muscles are missing I would guess.
It's a curious choice that the color for the 20% – 24% range is a more neutral color and even 15% – 19% is blue which is usually a more safe color. Isn't a fifth of a state's population being obese more of a danger sign deserving a color that says "Hey this is an issue!!" than beige?
9 of the top 12 fat states also happen to be in the top 14 states for percentage of population on food stamps. So they are not only fat, they are paid to be fat by the taxpayers. And the democrats think this is just great and we should be doing more of the same.
And 3 of the 12 aren't. So you're just going to throw that data out because it conflicts with your previously-held view of cause-and-effect which doesn't exactly jump headlong into scientific analysis.
I agree with Philip. I kept wondering "what's up with CO"? You'd never guess from a cursory reading of the map that MN was in worse shape than CO.
How To Lie With Maps is a good resource for this sort of discussion. I'm not suggestion a nefarious plot here, as it is more likely to be accidentally bad mapmaking instead of intentionally bad mapmaking. But it's bad mapmaking nonetheless.
(I've studied mapmaking, although I never entered the field directly).
You can find Minnesota county comparisons at the CDC website.
Ramsey county is fatter than Hennepin county. Chew on that while at the State Fair.