Kathleen Lucadamo, NY Daily News, has some startling revelations in an ‘ Obecity fat study’ regarding New York’s collective waistline.

New Yorkers collectively gained more than 10 million pounds in two years, according to Health Department data released Wednesday. During the same period, between 2002 and 2004, obesity rates and diabetes cases swelled 17% and 173,500 of New Yorkers moved into the obesity range, health officials found. Health bigwigs blamed syrupy sodas in part for the city’s fat surge, saying that 27% of New Yorkers drink nearly two sodas a day - 300 nutrition-free calories. The survey of 10,000 adults showed that obesity ballooned 20% among whites in the city compared with 7% nationally. Obesity rates here grew 14% among Hispanics but nationally didn’t rise significantly for groups other than whites. Foreign-born New Yorkers experienced the sharpest increase in obesity at 33% since 2002, meaning that 22.4% of that population is obese.  

10 million pounds in 2 years…I have this mental picture of a fat waldo named New York who just gained 10 million pounds. Wow! Time to dust off the old nike and join the fitness freaks at central park. But seriously, exrecise and diet is just one-half of the equation. Fact of the matter is that New Yorkers are exposed to much more culinary delights than other cities. There’s so much more to eat - so many restaurants, so many diners, so many tempatations, and the food is so cheap (some NYC residents might disagree, but it is cheap, if you know the right places…). In fact, I’d say that New York, along with a lot of other awards, also takes the cake for being the biggest food fanatic in the nation.

As Exhibit A, I present to you yesterday’s New York Times column by Henry Alford, whose sole mission is to explain how you can prepare delicious dishes and eat tasty stuff by buying ‘only at 99 cent stores and outlets’.

In fact, he labels his column as a primer on ‘How to survive in New York on 99 cents’. Here’s some brief excerpts.

 There are 99-cent stores, and then there is Jack’s. It’s Closeout Central, an off-brand oasis. Located at 110 West 32nd Street, near Herald Square, with satellite stores at 16 East 40th Street and 45 West 45th Street, Jack’s has not only lots of freezer cases and five or more aisles full of food, but also an upstairs gourmet section with more upscale items — Buitoni and Bertagni prepared pastas, Lindt and Ferrero chocolates, Hero jams — at prices ranging from about $1.99 to $4.99…I visited 21 more 99-cent stores in Manhattan, including 12 in Harlem and Washington Heights, 4 in Chinatown and 1 in Spanish Harlem.

And this is just in addition to all the cheap eats in Brooklyn and Queens and the dimsums and rice bowls Chinatown, and the low priced greasy soulfood and juicy New York steaks and ubiquitous burgers and hotdog stands and pizzerias. All this comes with the who-gives-a-shit nutrition-free abondon which poverty forces one into, washed down with sodas and draft beers which further set the calorie counters clanging.

This proves that it’s a crime to be poor or rich in New York, and not just because you have to pay more taxes than your fair share. Its also because you’re exposed to higher calories. The rich because they have the money to throw away at parties and stuff their faces from dawn to dusk, besides not having to do any work to burn thoise calories, and the poor because they have no choice - They have to eat cheap fatty foods and they have no jobs to burn the calories. The middle-class never had it so good…