The Rich Undernourished

Rich and upper-middle-class people who are blindly copying the western ways of life are spending a lot of money on fast food that has almost zero food value.

- Sri K. K. Bajaj

These people remain undernourished. It is high time we change our eating habits and switch to healthy food.

America’s war against junk food - The figures of fat people in the USA is frightening. The proportion of Americans who are obese rose from 15% in 1991 to 27% in 1999. Youngsters show the same trend: 10% of them are now obese. Add in the merely overweight and you cover 60% of American adults and 25% of children. David Satcher, who retired as a surgeon general, has estimated that obesity contributes 3,00,000 to the two million deaths each year in America. The treatment of diet-related diseases such as cancer and heart disease cost $117 billion in 2000 in the US alone. The Bush administration launched a $190m advertising campaign aimed at making children more energetic. Many schools moved to ban the sale of soft drinks in their schools. Many states in the USA are pushing for “sin taxes” on burgers and soft drinks. Recently, a New Yorker sued four fast-food chains. He had been eating their food regularly while his weight shot to 272 lbs (123 kg) and he had had two heart attacks. The restaurants, he said, had not warned him that this diet might be harmful.