ASSOCIATION BETWEEN EATING HABITS AND BODY MASS INDEX AMONG ADOLESCENTS IN SELECTED SECONDARY SCHOOLS IN ABAKALIKI METROPOLIS, EBONYI STATE

📄 Project Abstract

Obesity is the condition in which excess fat accumulates in the body, mostly in the subcutaneous tissues; clinically, obesity is considered when the body mass index is 30kg/m2and above for adults above 20 years (Matin, 2007) and 95 percentile and above for adolescents 11 - 19 years (WHO 2009). Obesity is from the Latin word obsesitas meaning stout or plump. The Oxford English Dictionary documented its first usage in 1611 by Randle Cotgrave and during the middle-ages and renaissance; obesity was often seen as a sign of affluence and was relatively common among the elites ((Woodhouse 2008)). From most of human history, mankind struggled with food scarcity and for that reason; obesity has been historically viewed as a sign of wealth and prosperity. The Greeks were the first to recognize obesity as a medical disorder; Hippocrates wrote that corpulence is not only a disease itself but harbinger of others (Woodhouse, 2008). In United States of America, 300,000 deaths are caused by obesity an...