Profiles of Missouri: Obesity Rate in Missouri

Abstract

According to a recent report from the Trust for America's Health (TFAH), obesity rates in all but one of our fifty U.S. states rose last year at an alarming rate (the exception is Oregon, where the rate remained the same as the previous year, and data are not available for Hawaii). In this report, F as in Fat: How Obesity Policies are Failing in America, 2005, TFAH outlines the nation's growing problem. Approximately 119 million Americans, or 64.5 percent, are either overweight or obese, and the number of obese American adults rose, according to TFAH, from 23.7 percent in 2003 to 24.5 percent in 2004. Although the national goal is 15 percent or less of the population being obese, in 10 states more than 25 percent of adults are obese, and the national average of obese adults is 16 percent. This includes about 16 percent of active duty U.S. military personnel.