Pobre México gordo

  An unwanted sign of North American convergence has been the convergence of the Mexican waistline with the American one. 

Today's Financial Times ran a story about obesity in Mexico.  The figures are sobering, and obvious to anyone who rides a pesero in Mexico City, although you could miss it in Polanco or Condesa.  4.1 million 5-to-11 year olds — 26% of the total — are overweight or obese.  Two-thirds of male adults are overweight, as are 71.9% of females. 

We wrote a bit about this in Mexico since 1980, especially in chapter 6.  Diabetes was the number-one killer when we wrote.  What we didn't know was that treating diabetes consumes one-third of the health budget, according to the FT.  Now, I still don't know that we know that, and I don't trust the FT's numbers.  But I believe the trend.

The future in most countries, I think, is going to be Big Government.  Soon what you eat and how you eat it will be taxed and regulated.  I don't particularly like the idea.  I used to be a heavy drinker, by American standards if not by European or Mexican ones, and the only reason I don't smoke a cigar or two every day is that my wife won't let me.  (That's also why I'm no longer a heavy drinker, in fact.)  But the fact is that nobody pays for their own health treatment in later life:  either an insurance company does, or, if you're under insured, the United States will pick up the tab.  So unless some sort of miracle Singularity-related program activity comes along to either make us all capable of pigging out and staying thin, or making it healthy to carry about lots of excess adipose tissue, Big Government is going to get what you eat. 

Or so I think at this particular moment.  As those of you who've known me know, I change my mind a lot.  It may be the only way in which I resemble Andrew Sullivan.  So, in that vein, counterarguments?

Comments

[Peter]

People of Mexican descent in the United States also have high obesity rates. While economic factors and dietary changes certainly are important, it's not beyond the realm of possibility that genetic factors are at play too.

[Noel Maurer]

It is clear that dietary changes (possibly driven by economics) are the only cause for the rapid rise in obesity. After all, the genetic makeup of Mexico's population hasn't changed.

I don't think that's the question you're asking, however. You're asking whether the population of Mexico is, for genetic reasons, more susceptible to obesity than the native-born white population of the U.S. It's certainly a reasonable hypothesis.

The test, however, isn't whether people of Mexican descent in the United States show higher obesity rates than native-born whites.

It's whether they higher obesity rates than native-born whites after adjusting for education and income.

I'm not sure that's true.

[Peter]

A theory in the recent book The 10,000-Year Explosion says that the descendants of groups that were late to adopt agriculture, or never adopted it prior to Western contact, are prone to higher rates of diabetes regardless of income or diet. Given that Mexicans are predominately of Amerindian descent, that might explain their high rates of diabetes, most Amerindians having adopted agriculture less than 2,000 years ago.

I don't know how widely accepted this theory has become.

[pc]

Here's an article that supports the changes in diet factor. The first few paragraphs get at the heart of it. The last section also talks about a very timid self-regulation in Mexico that will fall short of initiating any major change, but could be the first step toward the big government that you talked about.

http://www.poder360.com/article_detail.php?id_article=1142

One other thing that I think could be a factor (albeit a minor one) among youth obesity is the popularity of video games among middle class teenagers. Lots of wiis and playstation 3s in wealthier Mexican homes. Although for that to hold water in explaining the rise in obesity there would have to be more gaming systems today than there were segas and nintendos ps2s in the mid-90s, which I'm not sure there are.