Tuesday, April 12, 2011

15 % Obesity rate in the Palestinian territories

Some old lady on campus handed me a brochure on the starving children of Gaza last Friday. Why do some people think that making up facts is the road to peace?

I see no scholarly evidence ANYWHERE that children are "starving" in Gaza. Rather, there is much evidence to the contrary. Three minutes at the National Library of Health Website yielded a document that discusses an "alarming" obesity rate for Palestinian school children. And no, its not from some "Zionist" publication- its from the Lancet.

Nutritional Status in Palestinian Schoolchildren living in West Bank and Gaza : a cross Sectional Survey funded by the World Food programe, published online July 2, 2010. 15% Obesity rate in the territories. Thats the same as Canada.

The article goes on to state "The high proportions of overweight and obesity might be attributable to children's poor eating habits (well, duh!) and consumption of unhealthy food and snacks. " Thats NOT Israel's fault.

This article, Associations of Overweight and of Weight dissatisfaction among Palestinian Adolescents: findings from the national study of Palestinian schoolchildren claims " 16.5% of the adolescents were overweight". Its from a Belgian Journal on Human Nutrition, again, not some "Zionist" rag.

Time to get real, people.

UPDATE:
Thanks, Yasmeen, for sending this chart on worldwide obesity from the Economist. Its a bit dated, but still, if under Israel's brutal and genocidal occupation obesity was so widespread, how can you wonder if its not some dastardly zionist plot to, uh, uh....oh, I don't know, but its clearly some dastarly Zionist plot.



UPDATE AGAIN:
Thanks to an anonymous poster, we have even more up to date info on Gaza obesity rates, with range from 30- 40% and higher

This is from a June 2010 article : "Hyperglycaemia, hypertension and their risk factors among Palestine refugees served by UNRWA"

2 comments:

  1. http://www.emro.who.int/publications/emhj/1606/article5.htm Some students show a 30-40% obesity rate in Gaza, including this one "Hyperglycaemia, hypertension and their risk factors among Palestine refugees served by UNRWA"

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  2. http://www.hindawi.com/journals/jobes/2012/213547/ Brand new study on Obesity in the Palestinian territories
    Ziad Abdeen,1,2 Christine Jildeh,3 Sahar Dkeideek,1 Radwan Qasrawi,1 Ibrahim Ghannam,1 and Haleama Al Sabbah4,5
    1Al-Quds Nutrition and Health Research Institute, Al-Quds University, Jerusalem 20760, Palestine
    2Faculty of Medicine, Al-Quds University, P.O. Box 51000, Jerusalem, Palestine
    3Department of Social Medicine, School of Medicine, University of Crete, P.O. Box 2208, 71003 Iraklion, Crete, Greece
    4Jean Mayer USDA Human Nutrition Research Centre, Tufts University, 711 Washington Street, Boston, MA 02111, USA
    5Faculty of Medicine, An-Najah National University, P.O. Box 7, Nablus, West Bank, Palestine

    This paper presents the results of the first national survey of its kind in Palestine which clearly shows that more than sixty percent of the Palestinian population between 18 and 64 years old are overweight (38.0%) or obese (24.4%).

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