New hypothesis: Obesity Could Be Caused By a Virus
Unhealthy eating habits, sedentarism and genetic inheritance have been so far the incriminated causes of obesity. Today researchers present a new hypothesis - the existence of a virus, which could be the responsible for obesity. The interest for this theory started when doctor Nikhil Dhurandhar and other researchers from Wisconsin, SUA have discovered that mice and chickens infected with a virus called AD-36 have more fat than the healthy ones and gain weight faster than the uninfected ones.
The studies conducted on people have shown that 3 out of 10 individuals affected by obesity presented signs of exposure to AD-36, compared to less than 1 out of 10 people with normal weight. These studies suggest a link between antibodies that appear after exposure to AD-36 and human obesity, but the mechanism isn’t yet discovered. Could a virus be blamed for the alarming increased obesity rate in the last few decades?
The idea that a virus could be responsible for obesity will catch on those that blame it all on fatality. They will be consoled by the fact that the way they look is beyond their control. Who knows? Maybe in their case it is just a virus…Still, excluding the genetic inheritance, which is a predisposal factor, not a cause by itself for most obese people, the factors that must be incriminated are unhealthy eating habits and sedentarism, in other words - too many calories ,too little exercising. Worldwide, especially in the developed countries, statistics show that there is an accelerated rate of the food consumed at each meal, starting since 1970.In other order of ideas, the british researchers have discovered that the country population exercises less ,compared to few decades ago, and there is an increased obesity rate, especially among car owners.
In an edition of the British Medical Journal, it is stated that an english person spends over 26 hours/week watching TV, compared to only 13 hours in the 60’s. Their conclusion was that the lack of physical exercises is the main factor for the installation of obesity and this is the key point for eradicating this condition. So, could obesity be caused by the AD-36 virus? Probably yes, the future researches will shade some light in this matter. Still, the fact remains that physical exercises and a balanced diet are the main points of interest in the fight against extra weight.