Harvard has something called an Evolutionary Dynamics Biophysics Program, in which someone named Alison Hill was the author of a study published in something called PLoS Computational Biology.
Currently the U.S. Center for Disease Control has the American adult obesity rate at 34%, with another 34% of Americans being overweight, but not obese.
The Harvard/MIT study looked at obesity as an infectious disease, somehow determining that American obesity rates will rise for another 40 years, leveling off in 2050 with 42% of Americans being obese.
If I am understanding it correctly, according to this study, obesity spreads like an infection. The more obese people, in your personal social network, the more likely you also will become obese, with, on average, a normal weight person having a 2% chance of becoming obese. That % increases 0.4% with each obese person with whom you have close contact.
Apparently the opposite does not work. Obese people do not lose weight if their social contacts are non-obese people.
If I am understanding it correctly, the theory is when you hang out with obese people you are exposed to, and may succumb to their bad habits, thus catching the Obesity Infection.
In my totally humble opinion, it seems ridiculous to predict the American obesity level 40 years in the future. Maybe a magic bullet will come along and cause a massive letting out of the air in the millions of American balloon people, well before 2050.
But, I am taking no chances. I have already eliminated all obese people from my social network. Better safe than sorry.
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