Nearly 50% of survey respondents say they're fat and 54% of all the respondents have never been on a diet. And 67% of them hardly ever exercise.

Almost half (48%) of South Africans think they're “carrying a few extra kilograms” they “wouldn’t mind losing”. And it's not their imagination. These stats tally with those of medical researchers, who say just under half of South Africans are overweight or obese.

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While one in every two of us is wobbling down the street, a third (33%) describe themselves as “just right” and 8% as “overweight and I hate it”. Just over 4% think they are too skinny.

Where our stats come from
Business first: where did our stats come from? Just over 15 000 people filled in Health24’s Health of the Nation Survey, and the weighted results are representative of 2,5 million South Africans over the age of 20, educated to at least matric level, with a monthly income of over R4 500. If that sounds like you, then this survey is about you.

Are fatties social outcasts who have no friends, constantly listen to nasty remarks about their weight, and see a look of terror in everyone's eyes as they waddle down the aisle in the plane?

Men, women and weight
Oddly enough, as many as 72% of the respondents say they don’t experience any cultural pressure about their weight. By race, Asian/Indian people are most likely to experience cultural pressure about being too fat (11%) compared to the average of 8%. They are also most likely to say they experience pressure about being too thin (5%) compared to the 3% average.

And it comes as no surprise that women experience more cultural pressure over their weight than men do. The beer boep has almost become a status symbol among SA men.

Sixty-two percent of women respondents say they don’t experience any cultural pressure over weight, compared to 79% of men.

As many as 15% of Asian and Coloured women say they experience pressure about being too fat compared to 12% of black women and only 10% of white women. These people obviously never watch television ads, or read magazines.

The trends for men are different. Asian men are most likely to experience “fat” pressure (10%) followed by Coloured men (8%) white men (5%) and black men (3%).

And now for the really unexpected news: 54% of people in this demographic say they have never been on a diet. This drops to 34% among women and rises to 70% among men. Black women were most likely to say they had never dieted among women (42%) while 23% of white women have been on diets.

Meal stats
What do people's eating habits look like? How do you fare against these averages? Here are some interesting findings:

• some 49% of people say they always eat breakfast
• 13% say they don’t eat breakfast
• only 37% of those who describe themselves as “too skinny” eat breakfast.
• those who describe themselves as “just right” are most likely to eat breakfast (51%).
• the “just-rights” were also more likely than average to be strict about planning meals (16%) along with the “skinny and love it” (19%) and “overweight and love it” (22%).
• on average, 14% of the respondents were strict about planning meals.

Exercise stats
When you look at the revealing stats about the exercise habits of South Africans, it's not difficult to see why, as a nation, we're making the scales creak:

• 20% of respondents never exercise.
• A further 47% admit to doing so only occasionally
• Only 6% exercise every day, while 8% do so five times a week.

The message is clear: before we wobble to a collective early grave, it's time to get out those walking shoes, cancel the season ticket at the local junk food joint, and limit our time slouching on the couch.

(Susan Erasmus, Health24, October 2008) Read the full 2008 survey results right here.
 

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	accuracy 2008/10/15 10:32:11 AM How accurate is this article in terms of taking into consideration the entire country? the article mentions 48% of South Africans think they' re “ carrying a few extra kilograms. I personally have not taken part in any survey and neither has anyone of my family members or friends. So I would expect that it is 48% of those who participated in the survey not 48% of south africans. - tash   Tash 2008/10/15 11:21:27 AM Yes tash it' s how statistics work, don' t worry for you and your family member' s and friends lack of participation there are other people that took part, some of their family members did and some of their friends so it cancels out your lack of participation. But to be serious, 15 000 people is a large group so quite accurate. - Jono   Meaningless 2008/10/15 11:54:56 AM As far as I can tell the survey can' t be used to infer much. Asking a question like, " Are you overweight?"  doesn' t mean much since it' s often a case of perception. Also, it says nothing about how overweight someone is. This article is skewed since it' s implying that anyone who says they' re overweight must be so fat as to wobble around. I' m surprised they didn' t pull out the equally useless BMI measure. - CTheB   Meaningless+ 2008/10/15 12:24:42 PM How was the participants of this survey chosen? Did it take into account people from all walks of life? It looks like the survey was only targeted at people with Internet access. What about the millions of people that do not have Internet access? - Anon   Sloppy research 2008/10/15 12:49:38 PM I agree with Meaningless, Meaningless+ and Tash. This is extremely poor and very skewed and misleading research. In order for them to say " South Africans" , they should have done sampling and included people from all walks of life (gender, education level, literacy etc etc) - Agree   Skewed results 2008/10/15 12:59:37 PM So it' s a sample of 15000 people. Nice size, but hardly representative of the whole nation. What percentage of our people have internet access? And of those, what small number frequent Health24? I definitely agree with CTheB and the rest. And I' d add that yes, 50% of internet users probably are fat. Why don' t you go survey those that don' t have internet? - Petra   You mst be blind 2008/10/15 12:59:44 PM Regardless of the debate regarding accuracy of the research, have any of you actually looked at the ' person-off-the-street'  lately? I strongly agree that we are a gross, fat, wobbly nation. There seems to be absolutely no consideration given towards looking good and eating properly. I work in a company of approximately 800 staff members. The only person that moves quickly in our building is the Mr. Delivery guy. I agree with the research, just hope we start taking our health seriously.GO TO GYM - Bear   Basis incorrect 2008/10/15 01:04:20 PM The bais of this article seems to be unfounded. If one has to compare me with my BMi , I am perfect, fine and healthy. But if one asks me, I would say I would love a lose a kg or two. This artcle is not based on wieght, but how people view their own weight. Rather than asking people how they feel. The people should have submitted their weight and hight and thus the lacking researcher could have made assumptions regarding BMI, age and sex. This is research was a waste of time. - Tans   The person on the street 2008/10/15 01:27:52 PM I' ve just been out walking for 20 minutes and no way was 1 of every 2 people ' fat and wobbly' . Are we a healthy nation (on average) as far as weight goes? Almost certainly not. However, this survey provides no information with regard to that. It is the responsibility of the author of the article to make it known that the research does not in any way represent meaningful, useful information with regard to weight in South Africa, though the author would have us believe it does. - CTheB   Survey respondent 2008/10/15 01:30:47 PM I did do the survey and the questions were very detailed, regarding what your actual BMi weight statud is and what you feel your weight actually is. This reasearch was also done on a variety of people in each race and livfestyle. Therefore 15 000 people is a pretty big group and therefore the results are quite close to being correct. You must understand that a survey is a small sample used to generalise an outcome....it is not conclusive....it is a guide. - Faeriegun   Garbage in, garbage out! 2008/10/15 01:58:41 PM This is not at all representative of the nation. It represents the working few mostly  who sit on their fat bottoms during their work day at desks, are paid ' fairly'  well (relative to the majority of SA) and fill in surveys. Misleading bl00dy articel subject! - John   Local Junk Food 2008/10/15 02:21:42 PM If you think people of SA will leave without junk food think again. Remember that there are no jobs in mzanzi &  people are make money out of selling that junk food.... we can still excisize a &  eat junk food at the same time...wright! - Dineo Mofokeng   BMI? 2008/10/15 03:28:23 PM 15000 is large for a survey (standard survey sizes are in the region of 1000 to 2000). This doesn' t necessarily add to accuracy, though. BMI doesn' t really measure anything and it' s unfortunate that it has come to be believed to be a good measure of whether or not one is obese in spite of being shown time and again not to be particularly useful for that since it doesn' t take into account body composition. - CTheB   BMI and fat 2008/10/15 03:52:32 PM For the average person who rarely exercise, BMI pretty much tells the truth. We fool ourselves into believing we are not THAT overweight, until the truth hits. Most of us consume too much and exercise too little. And it is usually the overweight people who questions the measures and stats. The scale must be wrong! (But you are huffing and puffing just to step onto it whilst downing your beer and slobering up your biltong!)  a Bier-boep is not sexy! - Flooi   The minority of South Africans 2008/10/15 04:20:05 PM The majority of South Africans do not have internet access, so could not have taken this survey. It is stated in the article that this refers to a subgroup of SAfricans who have matric and beyond. But really the survey cannot make inferences about SAfricans in general, since there is a clear selection bias at play. Perhaps the article should say " News24 readers are overweight"  - Olivia   @Flooi 2008/10/15 04:53:34 PM On what do you base your claim that it' s usually overweight people who question the measures and stats? I' m not overweight at all, but I question BMI because there are numerous studies that show that it' s accuracy is limited at best, including ones that test BMI against people who do not exercise much. I question the measures and stats because this does not appear to have been a very well executed survey and I question the stats because they' re easy to misinterpret. - CTheB   The fat of the land 2008/10/15 05:01:11 PM What is a " fatty" ? It is a mean description degrading people. I have read many an article of the so called " fatty"  who is more healthier that his/her skinny counterpart. I' ve seen " skinny"  people died of a heart attack. As South Africans we need to be physically active on a larger schale. So by the way, some people have to sit on chairs the whole day, it is their work. I agree, the stats are skewed because everyone do not have access to the internet. - Annelize   Personal Perceptions 2008/10/15 05:24:46 PM You either like yourself or not - why do we always have to clasify people. Our focus MUST shift to HOW DO WE GET PEOPLE MOVING, even just a bit. Get used to the fact that all of us are individuals, thank goodness we will never all look exactly the same! Think HEALTHY not skinny - 2 very different concepts. - MJS   Quality of research 2008/10/16 10:26:02 AM 15,000 is a large sample group, and the sample group was weighted (using the demographic questions answered) - it' s how market research is conducted. So we know that the survey represents the perceptions of 2,5m South African adults (over the age of 20) who' re educated up to matric level at least, and who earn R4 500 a month or more. I believe the story makes this clear. What you read here is statistically true for this group. - The editor - Heather   Who' s the culprit?? 2008/10/16 11:56:38 AM Why not do a proper survey on all the JUNK FOOD JOINTS? This will surely be a massive benefit to all SOUTH AFRICANS who eat out often. By the way how many of u critics own JUNK FOOD JOINTS and are not happy with this survey? WHAT ARE THESE JOINTS FEEDING US WITH? This is what makes the Nation FAT>  The Americans are masters when it comes to feeding their Nation with JUNK FOOD Now we are trying out this LOST ART OF KILLING THE NATION People are forced to eat out with todays demands. - Ronnie   Look around... 2008/10/16 01:12:48 PM Yeah the survey of 15000 people does not reflect the all nation but just look around when you go out shopping, look at the sizes of those bums, thighs, legs etc... Yes we are a nation of fatty people, blacks included. - Elio   Yeah another nutter trying to proof what? 2008/10/16 01:21:36 PM I am sure many wont like the way the report is written, rather degrading IMO. Next time I suggest you go and do research on why it is: 1)Expensive to buy health food. 2) SA people work long hours, reduced food prep. time leading to take aways. 3)Time for exercise, that dont exist in SA when you have a job &  family. Many don' t have 1 hour luch to go jym 4) Bad quality grocery from stores eg. Meat and vedge grown using growth stimulants. Just maybe then it may seem like you do research for good. - Jakkals   " think"  they' re carrying extra weight 2008/10/16 04:13:44 PM I have not seen the survey on which these findings are based, but I think that " statistical facts"  based on a question that asks if someone " THINKS that they are carrying a few extra kilograms"  is completely different to findings based on whether a person is ACTUALLY overweight. The large amount of people who feel they are overweight could just as easily reflect the fact South Africans are exposed to a Westernised ideal of extreme thinness, therefore reflecting the average person' s insecurity. - Melanie   Generalization 2008/10/16 05:00:31 PM The " half of South Africans"  is a misleading generalization. For the rest the article makes it clear that it is concerned with a particular sub-group of South Africans. The amount of criticism here is possible exactly because the article is open about where the stats comes from. - Zac
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