Obesity rates to skyrocket

California’s obesity rate will double by 2030 if current trends continue, a new national report finds.

The report, compiled by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Trust for America’s Health, projected the state’s obesity rate increasing from 23.8 percent to 46.6 percent, according to the Los Angeles Times. Additionally, the obesity rate for most states in the United States will increase above 50 percent in the same time frame. As a result, the United States would have 6 million new cases of Type 2 diabetes, 5 million new cases of coronary heart disease and stroke, and more than 400,000 new cases of obesity-related cancer. Additionally, obesity-related health-care costs would increase by $48 billion to $66 billion a year.

In a separate study, bisphenol A (BPA) has been linked to obesity among Caucasian children. New York University scientists found white children exposed to high levels of BPA—used in plastics, canned food containers and beverage containers—were five times more likely to be obese than white children with low levels of the chemical. Neither African-African nor Hispanic children had a statistically significant risk of BPA-related obesity.