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“We owe it to our military not only to give them weapons, but a good pool of candidates,” Bornstein said. “It’s society’s problem to solve."
"The study, Bornstein said, indicates that the same states “that are disproportionately burdensome for public health are also burdensome for our military.”
Unfit U.S. Army recruits may pose threat to military readiness
By American Heart Association News
Obesity and physical inactivity aren’t just health issues for our country. They’re a threat to national security.
That’s the contention of a new study in the Journal of Public Health Management and Practice, and potentially, a way to focus more attention on the need to improve diet and fitness.
“Maybe you don’t care about public health or the cost of treating diseases,” said Dr. Daniel Bornstein, an exercise scientist and lead author of the study. “But if you care about military readiness and national security, you have to care about fitness.”
Bornstein, assistant professor in the Department of Health, Exercise and Sport Science at The Citadel in Charleston, South Carolina, compared fitness levels of U.S. Army recruits from each of the 50 states and the District of Columbia - based on their times completing a 2-mile run - with their rates of injuries during basic training.
“As we expected, the correlation was quite high,” he said. “Recruits from states that have been producing worse fitness outcomes were more likely to become injured in basic training.”
At the top of the list in both categories were states in the American South, a swath stretching from Texas to Florida.
Southern states often rate poorly in health statistics such as obesity, cardiovascular disease and diabetes, and experts point to factors including poverty, poor diet, less access to health care, sedentary lifestyles and a tradition of fried foods. The study, Bornstein said, indicates that the same states “that are disproportionately burdensome for public health are also burdensome for our military.”
The burdens, he said, stem both from the cost of treating those injuries and the challenge of producing an effective fighting force. It’s even worse, he said, because a significant percentage of young Americans aren’t fit enough even to try to qualify for the military -- a common career path for young people in the South -- which could hurt communities in those states.
“We owe it to our military not only to give them weapons, but a good pool of candidates,” Bornstein said. “It’s society’s problem to solve. It’s too easy to point to the individual and say, ‘You need to be more physically active.’ We must undertake policies that will create environments that will allow more people to become more physically fit.”
<snip>
The majority of Southerners hate the idea of universal healthcare, funding K-12 publicly paid for nutritionally sound breakfasts, lunches and daily physical activity... instead they prefer to be fat unhealthy lazy slobs whose are now jeopardizing our national security.
.
“We owe it to our military not only to give them weapons, but a good pool of candidates,” Bornstein said. “It’s society’s problem to solve."
"The study, Bornstein said, indicates that the same states “that are disproportionately burdensome for public health are also burdensome for our military.”
Unfit U.S. Army recruits may pose threat to military readiness
By American Heart Association News
Obesity and physical inactivity aren’t just health issues for our country. They’re a threat to national security.
That’s the contention of a new study in the Journal of Public Health Management and Practice, and potentially, a way to focus more attention on the need to improve diet and fitness.
“Maybe you don’t care about public health or the cost of treating diseases,” said Dr. Daniel Bornstein, an exercise scientist and lead author of the study. “But if you care about military readiness and national security, you have to care about fitness.”
Bornstein, assistant professor in the Department of Health, Exercise and Sport Science at The Citadel in Charleston, South Carolina, compared fitness levels of U.S. Army recruits from each of the 50 states and the District of Columbia - based on their times completing a 2-mile run - with their rates of injuries during basic training.
“As we expected, the correlation was quite high,” he said. “Recruits from states that have been producing worse fitness outcomes were more likely to become injured in basic training.”
At the top of the list in both categories were states in the American South, a swath stretching from Texas to Florida.
Southern states often rate poorly in health statistics such as obesity, cardiovascular disease and diabetes, and experts point to factors including poverty, poor diet, less access to health care, sedentary lifestyles and a tradition of fried foods. The study, Bornstein said, indicates that the same states “that are disproportionately burdensome for public health are also burdensome for our military.”
The burdens, he said, stem both from the cost of treating those injuries and the challenge of producing an effective fighting force. It’s even worse, he said, because a significant percentage of young Americans aren’t fit enough even to try to qualify for the military -- a common career path for young people in the South -- which could hurt communities in those states.
“We owe it to our military not only to give them weapons, but a good pool of candidates,” Bornstein said. “It’s society’s problem to solve. It’s too easy to point to the individual and say, ‘You need to be more physically active.’ We must undertake policies that will create environments that will allow more people to become more physically fit.”
<snip>
The majority of Southerners hate the idea of universal healthcare, funding K-12 publicly paid for nutritionally sound breakfasts, lunches and daily physical activity... instead they prefer to be fat unhealthy lazy slobs whose are now jeopardizing our national security.
.
