Is Louisiana The Fattest State In America?

So yesterday I wrote a blog about boudin, one of the unique foods indigenous to Louisiana.  Boudin, of course, is a sausage that is filled with pork and rice and spices.  What it does not contain, generally speaking, are vegetables or fruit.  Apparently, vegetables and fruit are not popular staples in a typical Louisianan's diet.

According to a new WalletHub report, Louisiana ranks 2nd in the U.S. for the lowest percentage of adults who eat less than one serving of fruits and vegetables per day.  Couple this with the fact that Louisiana state ranks 5th in the percentage of physically inactive adults, and we have a major obesity problem in our state.

The new study--2017's Fattest States in America--ranks Louisiana as the 5th-Fattest State in America.  As they do with all of their studies, WalletHub analyzed a number of metrics from "share of overweight and obese population to sugary-beverage consumption among adolescents to obesity-related health care costs."

Here's how Louisiana ranks in some key areas of the obesity study:

• 1st in percentage of obese adults.
• 5th in percentage of obese children
• 3rd in percentage of adults with hypertension
• 8th in percentage of adults with Type 2 Diabetes

November is National Diabetes Month which aims to increase awareness of the monetary and human costs of this disease.  In 2015 the estimated cost of diabetes in the U.S. was $407.6 billion.  Those costs include direct medical costs and non-medical costs.  The average annual medical costs for a person with diabetes total $7,900.

With these facts in mind, the next time we have a big serving of boudin, maybe we should pair it with a few snap beans and some shoepeg corn.  And maybe a baked apple for dessert.