The topic that I chose for my Op-Ed piece / Opinion Essay is obesity in the United states and why it should be taken more seriously. In my preliminary research I found that 42.4 percent of people in the U.S are obese as of 2018. Obesity has been an uprising issue because in the year 2000 the obesity percentage was 30 percent and it has now risen to over 40 percent. Being obese has shown to decrease the quality of life and has also been associated with poor mental health. It puts you at an increased risk of developing diseases such as heart disease, diabetes, strokes which all fall in the top 10 leading causes of death in the United States.
My 3 questions are : How did so many people become obese in the united States ? Has there been anything done to lower the obesity rate ? Why is healthy food so expensive while unhealthy junk food that has been associated with weight gain so cheap ?
This seems like a clear topic. Will you be focusing on a particular idea of how to take it seriously? Or is your point that we don’t and need to?