Fat soldiers increasing headache for US military

By Ko Dong-hwan

Obesity is becoming an increasing problem for American soldiers, according to CNBC.

The reasons are two-fold ― fast food chains such as Taco Bell and Burger King, which have been opening their stores in the military bases, appear to be influencing soldiers’ eating habits significantly.

The U.S. military also greatly depends on advanced machinery and weapons in these regions of tension such as Iraq and Afghanistan and this seems to have reduced the need for soldiers to stay in shape all the time.

About 2,000 soldiers were discharged from the U.S. military in the past 10 months because they were measured as too obese. Two-thousand represents a 15-fold increase from the matching period of five years ago, according to the report.

The U.S. military reported in 2010 that more than five percent of its entire personnel have experienced health problems involving obesity. About 75 percent of Americans aged between 17 and 24 are obese and thus unfit for enlistment. This is bad news for the U.S. military, which needs to recruit 57,000 new soldiers every year.