I welcome the survey on health and lifestyle in north-eastern Germany, over a lengthy period of time, which Elkeles and colleagues reported. I wish to add two aspects (1).
The more than fourfold increase of the population exercising actively to a total of 56.3% in 2008 compared with 1994 should be interpreted cautiously or put into perspective. Studies that specify criteria about exercise behavior to a measure from which health effects can be expected have shown poignantly lower rates. This means that a classification of physical activity and exercise on the basis of energy consumption can be classed as more meaningful than individual information about exercise activity (2).
Furthermore, from the perspective of ecotrophology, the reduction in the proportion of people with enough time to eat and consume their main meal that was observed over the study period may be partly responsible for the slight increase in the prevalence of obesity, since significant evidence exists for the association of a high eating speed and the development of overweight for children as well as adults (3).
References
- 1.Elkeles T, Beck D, Röding D, Fischer S, Forkel JA. Health and lifestyle in rural northeast Germany: the findings of a rural health study from 1973, 1994, and 2008. Dtsch Arztebl Int. 2012;109(16):285–292. doi: 10.3238/arztebl.2012.0285. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- 2.Macera CA, Ham SA, Jones DA, Kimsey CD, Ainsworth BE, Neff LJ. Limitations on the use of a single screening question to measure sedentary behavior. Am J Public Health. 2001;91:2010–2012. doi: 10.2105/ajph.91.12.2010. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- 3.Hofmeister M. Essgeschwingkeit und Adipositas - Eine Meta-Analyse. Ernährung im Fokus. 2011;11:390–397. [Google Scholar]