Doctors are urging the millions of people who work at a desk all day to stand up or walk around the office.

As CBS 2′s Dr. Max Gomez reported, our couch-potato lifestyle is killing us at about the same rate as smoking.

And it’s not just sitting around at home; it’s also our sit-for-hours workdays that are part of an unhealthy sedentary lifestyle.

“Sitting is probably killing me,” said Linda Caufield, of Bay Ridge, Brooklyn.

Caufiled is right. A number of studies have shown that prolonged sitting is linked to an increased risk of heart disease, obesity, diabetes, cancer and even early death.

“Smoking certainly is a major cardiovascular risk factor, and sitting can be equivalent in many cases,” said Dr. David Coven, a cardiologist at St. Luke’s-Roosevelt Hospital Center. “The fact of being sedentary causes factors to happen in the body that are very detrimental.”

A recent study shows levels of physical activity and lower levels of sitting time were positively associated with excellent health and quality of life.

The obvious solution is to exercise more, but busy lifestyles and a common aversion to exercise make it hard to compensate for hours of sitting at a desk.

The good news, said Dr. Dermont Phelan, of the Cleveland Clinic, is “that doesn’t mean that we have to go to the gym for 30 minutes in the day. Just a brisk walk, and we don’t have to do it continuously. Even doing 10 minutes three times a day will work.”

While not an equal substitute for exercise, some doctors recommend getting up once an hour from your desk, even if it’s just to walk around briefly or go to the bathroom. Some people have even started using combination treadmill desks at work — anything that contracts our muscles and gets blood flowing.

“It dampens down inflammation,” Phelan explained. “It dampens down the risk of depositing plaque in the coronary arteries.”

Sitting At Work For Hours Can Be As Unhealthy As Smoking « CBS New York

That figure, though, is just the tip of the iceberg. As all the research shows, we Brits are fatter and heavier than ever before in history, with one in four of us now classified as obese (a BMI between 30 and 40) – a figure which has more than doubled in the last quarter of a century – while a further third are overweight (a BMI between 25 and 29).

It’s not only our BMIs that are on a dangerous upward curve. Waistlines are expanding too, especially as we get older, when metabolic rate slows and body fat accumulates. Recent figures show that 30 per cent of men and 55 per cent of women aged 60 to 70 having a waist size of 102cm/40 inches and 88cm/34.5 inches respectively.

Corpulence has always been with us of course, although in former times it was associated with the rich. The lower classes, fed mostly on bread and jam with maybe a few scraps of meat on Sundays, tended to be weak and scrawny – as was noted with some alarm by officials sizing up recruits for the Boer War, in the first systematic measurements of height and weight ever undertaken.

Why is Britain fatter than ever? – Telegraph

The NHS has warned that people are ‘pouring money down the drain’ with fad New Year diets and has launched its own 12 week weight-loss plan.

January traditionally sees hundreds of miracle diet and detox plans rushed out in an attempt to cash-in on the guilt many feel after an over-indulgent Christmas.

But health experts warn that few have any nutritional or scientific basis and rarely work in the long term. Some can even be dangerous, they claim.

Now a simple four month plan has been developed by the NHS and British Dietetic Association (BDA) based on the latest advice on diet and exercise.

“Every year, people pour millions of pounds down the drain to no avail following one fad diet or another,” said Professor Susan Jebb, of Oxford University, an advisor on obesity for the government

“There is no easy way to lose weight, but the NHS Weight Loss guide is full of valuable tips and support to help you put your good intentions into practice.

“It is free, straightforward and based on the best available evidence of what helps people to succeed in losing weight.

Stop pouring money down drain with fad diets, warns NHS – Telegraph

Sarah Massey would be just another 33-year-old mother-of-two from Chicago — if it weren’t for the fact that she also happens to have the world’s biggest butt.

Though not officially recognized by the prudes at Guinness, Massey’s massive 7-foot wide keister requires a pair of 10XL trousers that would komfortably fit all of the Kardashian sisters kombined.

Massey insists the condition that resulted in her museum-sized bubble butt is hereditary — “there’s nothing I can do about it,” she says — but that her love of ice cream certainly contributed to its maintenance.

Though she grew up feeling ashamed of her dimensions, adulthood taught Massey that many men admire curvy girls.

She told Barcroft Media the discovery came about by accident: She had taken a few photos to document her weight loss, which a friend then uploaded to Facebook.

“They got so many likes that he asked if we could do some modelling pictures, then those pictures went viral,” she recalled.

Massey would still like to lose some weight, but says she now has a new-found appreciation for her natural assets, and fervently defends them against anyone who calls them fake.

“Some people can’t believe one person can have this much butt,” she told Barcroft. “Because I’ve got a relatively small frame on top they say, ‘that can’t be real.’ I carry this weight with me all the time, everywhere I go, it’s definitely not fake. Big booties are just in my blood.”

Fat Thanks to Anant P. for the tip!

Woman With World’s Largest Ass: People Shocked I Have ‘This Much Butt’

A simple question on social media about one of the most popular dolls in the United States has created an online tug-of-war over obesity and body image.

The site Plus-size-Modeling posted a pic of a plus-sized Barbie on Facebook December 18 with the caption: “Should toy companies start making plus-sized Barbie dolls?”

HLN has reached out repeatedly to the site, but has not heard back. Meanwhile, the post has garnered nearly 40,000 likes and more than 2,400 comments, with many people agreeing with one premise — that Barbie, a relic of the 1950s, should be reinvented and depicted in a more realistic way. But many people are outraged at the imagery, saying that an “obese” doll promotes unhealthiness rather than “realness.”

“Barbie doesn’t need a double chin. You can be ‘plus size’ w/o the double chin. They could make a ‘thick’ Barbie,” user Vanessa M. commented on Facebook.

“This is not what plus size women looks like. This doll is a terrible impression of a plus size woman,” said Facebook commenter Lisa D.

Fat Thanks to Mike F. for the tip!

Plus-sized fuss: Double-chinned Barbie raises ire | HLNtv.com

It seems that McDonald’s has finally realized how tone-deaf its internal employee resource website was. It has shut it down.

The final straw? A tip on the site to employees to avoid McDonald’s fare.

A graphic on the site shows a meal with a cheeseburger, fries and drink under the caption “Unhealthy choice.” Next to it is a picture of a sub, a salad and water under the caption “Healthier choice.”

The latest embarrassment is among a string that’s cropped up since the McResource Line website went live.

A McResource budget-planning guide for its employees was ridiculed in July for being out of touch.

“For starters, it didn’t account for food and gasoline,” CNNMoney reported. “The second line on the sample budget leaves room for income from a second job, which many called an admission by the fast food giant that its workers can’t live on its wages alone.”

And then earlier this month, NBC News reported that the site offered a guide on how much one should tip a pool cleaner, housekeeper, and even an au pair.

The only problem: The University of California Berkeley Labor Center and University of Illinois released a study in October that said 52% of families of fast food workers receive assistance from a public program like Medicaid, food stamps, the Earned Income Tax Credit or Temporary Assistance for Needy Families.

The fast food giant found itself again having to deflect unwanted attention from its internal site this week after CNBC reported that McResource ostensibly advises McDonald’s employees to not eat at McDonald’s.

“Fast foods are quick, reasonably priced, and readily available alternatives to home cooking. While convenient and economical for a busy lifestyle, fast foods are typically high in calories, fat, saturated fat, sugar, and salt and may put people at risk for becoming overweight.”

Visitors to McResource Line on Wednesday were greeted with this statement: “We are temporarily performing some maintenance in order to provide you with the best experience possible. Please excuse us while these upgrades are being made.”

McDonald’s confirmed the site had been taken down in a statement posted on its website. “A combination of factors has led us to re-evaluate and we’ve directed the vendor to take down the website. Between links to irrelevant or outdated information, along with outside groups taking elements out of context, this created unwarranted scrutiny and inappropriate commentary. None of this helps our McDonald’s team members.”

McDonald’s on employee resources site: Not lovin’ it – CNN.com