Brazil, Land of Itsy-Bitsy Bikinis, Gets Fatter

It may be known as the land of slender supermodels, champion soccer players and itsy-bitsy bikinis, but Brazil is increasingly fattening up like the United States.

A government study released on Thursday said 40 percent of Brazilian adults, or about 40 million people, are considered overweight and another 11.1 percent are obese. The culprit appears to be the South American country’s sweet tooth, a lack of exercise and the gradual replacement of staples like rice and beans for processed foods, like cookies and soft-drinks, the report said. “We eat a diet that is highly caloric, rich in sugar and poor in healthy foods,” Carlos Augusto Monteiro, an advisor to Brazil’s health ministry, told a news conference. “On top of that, there’s a significant amount of the population that lives a sedentary lifestyle, and its higher among the lower class.” The percentage of overweight men in Brazil has doubled over the last 30 years and the number of obese men has tripled. The percentage of overweight and obese women has doubled, according to the report by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics. By comparison, more than 60 percent of Americans are overweight or obese, putting them at higher risk of heart disease, diabetes and some cancers. Overweight is defined by the World Health Organization as having a body mass index of 25 percent to 29.9 percent. People with a body mass index of 30 percent or higher are considered obese.(Source: Reuters Health, December 2004)