Everyone knows that to live a healthy life, we must eat good food and exercise. Despite this knowledge, two-thirds of Americans are considered overweight or obese. The United States has the highest rate of obesity in the world. Obesity is associated with diabetes, depression, sleep apnea, cardiovascular, and many other health issues. The scariest part of this story is the increasing rate of obesity in children. If this obesity epidemic isn’t stopped soon, there will be many costs including rising health care costs.
Society has created the view that those who are obese are just lazy people. While obesity can be a result of personal choice, brain dysfunction and genetics can play a role too. Overnutrition, which includes the high fat and carbohydrate diet, leads to an increase in weight and insulin resistance. This leads to inflammation and oxidative stress. This causes the structure of the brain to change. In obese patients, the hippocampus’ size is diminished. This part of the brain plays a role in memory processing. There is a correlation between obesity and memory dysfunction. This pathway also causes dysfunction in appetite behavior. There is research looking at how insulin resistance and hypothalamic inflammation causes people to lose their ability to control hunger. Simply, people are not able to stop themselves from eating even when they are full. This would begin the cycle of overnutrition again. This suggest the idea that obesity can be a result of addiction to food.
There are genetic components to obesity that are being researched. The major one I want to highlight is leptin. Leptin is a hormone that triggers a response that tells you to stop eating. It is created by fat cells and inhibits the neuropeptide Y (NPY) neuron. When NPY isn’t inhibit, it signals to the brain that a person needs to eat more because they’re hungry. Leptin stops this neuron from signaling. When the gene that encodes for leptin is knocked out, leptin can’t be produced. This results in a person feeling hungry and having strong cravings. This eventually leads to overeating and obesity.
This topic caused an interesting debate in our class. We had to decide if obesity was a true brain disorder or if it was the result of personal choice. There wasn’t a definite consensus. I don’t think you can put it down to one or the other. I can see both sides to the argument, and that’s why I believe obesity to be a combination of the two. There is some personal choice at the start of the obesity path. We choose what we eat and if we exercise or not. Once we choose to eat high fat and carb foods, this is where the brain disorder can begin. This is definitely true of those who are genetically predisposed to obesity (leptin patients). This addiction is hard to break, but we still have the choice to stop it. While there will always be debate over obesity and how to fix it, it is important to continue this research on obesity since it effects so many.
Resources:
Obesity in the USA
https://moodle.cord.edu/pluginfile.php/390940/mod_resource/content/0/obesity%20a%20brain%20disease.pdf
http://neurochemistry2014.pbworks.com/w/page/88796942/Is%20Obesity%20a%20Brain%20Disease
Obesity: Who or what is to blame?
