Abraham Leon was getting a checkup when he found out he had high blood pressure and was at risk of developing diabetes.
On the spot, the 168cm, 109kg lab researcher joined “Vamos Por Un Million de Kilos,” (Let’s Lose a Million Kilos), a national campaign to get Mexicans to collectively trim about 910,000kg.
The project is one of several new efforts to fight obesity in Mexico, which is on track to catch up with the US within a decade as one of the world’s fattest countries, according to the Mexican government. Nearly half of Mexico’s 110 million people are overweight, and the number of fat children has climbed 8 percent a year in the last decade.
“The longer we carry this excess weight, the more serious the problem becomes,” said Samuel Flores Huerta, director of the Department of Community Health at Mexico’s Children’s Hospital.
“Obesity is costing this country a lot of money.”
Mexico is working to mandate more physical education in public schools and encourage employers and unions to give workers time for exercise. The administration of Mexican President Felipe Calderon says it has built or renovated more than 800 public sports facilities around the country. And the National Institute of Public Health is promoting food education and healthier choices in schools, such as fruits and vegetables instead of chips and soda.
Mexican cuisine has always been high in fat and carbohydrates.
But for decades, people living in small villages could not grow enough crops to eat, and had to travel long distances to gather more food.
Now, as the middle class grows and more people move to cities seeking work, diets have become laden with processed and fast foods.
Archeologists in Peru on Thursday said they found the 5,000-year-old remains of a noblewoman at the sacred city of Caral, revealing the important role played by women in the oldest center of civilization in the Americas. “What has been discovered corresponds to a woman who apparently had elevated status, an elite woman,” archeologist David Palomino said. The mummy was found in Aspero, a sacred site within the city of Caral that was a garbage dump for more than 30 years until becoming an archeological site in the 1990s. Palomino said the carefully preserved remains, dating to 3,000BC, contained skin, part of the
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
TRUMP EFFECT: The win capped one of the most dramatic turnarounds in Canadian political history after the Conservatives had led the Liberals by more than 20 points Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday pledged to win US President Donald Trump’s trade war after winning Canada’s election and leading his Liberal Party to another term in power. Following a campaign dominated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats, Carney promised to chart “a new path forward” in a world “fundamentally changed” by a US that is newly hostile to free trade. “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but we should never forget the lessons,” said Carney, who led the central banks of Canada and the UK before entering politics earlier this year. “We will win this trade war and
Armed with 4,000 eggs and a truckload of sugar and cream, French pastry chefs on Wednesday completed a 121.8m-long strawberry cake that they have claimed is the world’s longest ever made. Youssef El Gatou brought together 20 chefs to make the 1.2 tonne masterpiece that took a week to complete and was set out on tables in an ice rink in the Paris suburb town of Argenteuil for residents to inspect. The effort overtook a 100.48m-long strawberry cake made in the Italian town of San Mauro Torinese in 2019. El Gatou’s cake also used 350kg of strawberries, 150kg of sugar and 415kg of
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