Virginia's obesity epidemic
By Jon Breece | April 18, 2005Virginia is becoming a fat state. And yes, Virginia -- despite being home to Pharrell and Missy "Misdemeanor" Elliott -- that is F-A-T, not P-H-A-T. The federal Behavior Risk Factor Surveillance System, a subset of the Center for Disease Control and Promotion, found 23.7 percent of 1,027 Virginia adult residents contacted in a 2002 telephone survey qualified as being obese. Virginia has had the largest nationwide increase in the percentage of citizens who are obese in the last 12 years. Only 9.9 percent of the 170 Virginians contacted in a 1990 survey qualified as being obese.