Daily HealthBeat Tip - June 23, 2008

Not inevitable weight

From the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, I’m Ira Dreyfuss with HHS HealthBeat.

As most Americans struggle with their weight, some don’t. There are groups of us, in fact, who seem to have the weight issue under control. At Wake Forest University School of Medicine, Gregory Burke has been looking over survey data to tease out who does weight well.

Burke says Chinese-Americans – largely first- and second-generation, in the data he reviewed – were far less likely to be overweight than were whites and blacks. His conclusion is that overweight is not inevitable:

"We can emulate some of the behaviors – portion sizes, healthy eating habits, exercise habits that these Chinese-Americans have manifested." (8 seconds)

But Burke warns that if these Chinese-Americans start to eat or act more like everyone else, they’d wind up overweight too.

The study in Archives of Internal Medicine was supported by the National Institutes of Health.

Learn more at hhs.gov.

HHS HealthBeat is a production of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. I’m Ira Dreyfuss.

Last revised: June, 20 2008