Obesity maps of America show slender cities and a bulging countryside. In England the opposite is true: the overweight are concentrated in urban areas and rural folk are slimmer. In both countries obesity is associated with poverty. The differing patterns may be explained by the fact that much of England’s thin “countryside”, particularly in the south, in fact lies in the well-off commuter belts of cities. Remoter, poorer rural areas, in the far north, south-west and east, are tubbier. In both countries people underestimate how fat their fellow citizens are: most guess around half are overweight, when the reality is nearer two-thirds. On December 11th England’s chief medical officer called for obesity to be classified as a “national risk”. Food for thought over Christmas.
