America, how's that exercise thing going for you?
Wait, you don't have to say. It's embarrassing, we know, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention already told us anyway.
That fitness routine is sooo not working.
More Americans are spending some of their leisure time exercising, yet folks just keeps piling on the pounds.
Here are the cold, hard facts. About 35 percent of adults engage regularly in physical activity when they're not working, according to estimates based on a 2009 nationwide survey. That's up from 32 percent in 2008, which also happens to be about the same proportion of people exercising back in 1997.
Now, what's the scale tell us? Not good. More people in the U.S. are obese than ever. In 2009, about 28 percent of people in the U.S. were obese, up a fraction of a percent from 2008.
But hop in the Wayback Machine and check the weights in 1997. Nineteen percent of people in the U.S. were considered obese then.
There's not a moment to lose in doing something to reverse the weight trend. A recent study found that a substantial decline in the rate of heart attacks could be fleeting as obesity and diabetes become more prevalent.
Exercise can only burn so many calories. Eating better is crucial. Recommendations for new nutritional guidelines would cut saturated fats even more than in the past and promote healthier foods, like fruits and vegetables.
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