The Independent recently reported that chances of early death from preventable diseases is the same as smoking 10 cigarettes a day for overweight adolescents.
If you’re smoker, you know it (even if you lie to your mum). The tricky thing about obese teens in Fatville is they often don’t know they’re obese. They see their similarly sized friends and feel perfectly normal.
If your friends smoke you’re surrounded by a warm fug of collective solidarity. You feel no need to quit…even with the distant spectre of lung cancer.
It’s the same with obesity. If you look around and see that all of your friends are fat, where’s the impetus to change?