We all talk about and even joke about the US' obesity problem and unhealthy obsession with fast food but it's serious issue people. Check out these disturbing stats:



According to this article I read yesterday, obesity contributes to over 300,000 deaths each year in the US alone, most of which could be avoided if people just cut out the Big Macs and chips and introduced some fresh (unprocessed) food and greens into their diets. In fact it would be good if health officials closed down some of the zillion fast food restaurants out there and encouraged some healthy independent dining establishments to take their place.

The average meal at fast food restaurants provides a disproportionate amount of calories, fat, and sodium in one meal when you compare it with the recommended daily allowance (RDA). A Big Mac value meal contains 1,230 calories, 48 grams of fat, and 1,330 mg of sodium and our RDA is 2,000 calories, 65 g of fat and 2,300 mg of sodium. However McDonalds isn't the biggest culprit, the Triple Baconator Meal from Wendy’s takes the lead with 2,170 calories, 116 g fat, and 2,950 mg sodium, all of which exceed their RDAs. Gross gross gross.

Unfortunately, fast food is big business employing some 4 million Americans and earning around $178 billion in one year hence why the government is reluctant to make big changes to the industry. The number of fast food locations has doubled since they first became popular in the 1970s and children now eat more than five times the amount of fast food that they did before 1970. Obesity in children has more than tripled since 1980, and diabetes has doubled since 2000. And this problem is only going to get worse.....

Although after reading all this, I'm going to think twice about stepping foot into McDonalds or Wendy's again when I get a craving for a burger. I could probably eat three homemade burgers in one and still not tot up as many calories, fat and sodium.