Is religion dangerous to your health?

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Time Magazine July 9, 2009 UPDATE, UPDATE, UPDATE!!!
Time Magazine has finally noticed that the South has a higher percentage of lard asses than any other part of the country. They attribute Southerners' enormous girth to poverty, bad diet and lack of exercise. Maybe they're right. Maybe the fact that the most religious states are also the fattest is just a coincidence. Who knows.

July 1 2009

Could it be that religion is dangerous to your health? Does religion make people more likely to be overweight?

On May 25, I published a blog entitled Religion, Politics and Human Development.

In a nutshell, it showed that people who are more religious and live in states with low life expectancies, literacy rates, education and standard of living tend to vote Republican.

People who are less religious and live in states with higher life expectancies, literacy rates, education levels and standard of living tend to vote Democratic.

Now there seems to be a correlation between religion and body fat! Below is map measuring obesity rates in the states published by the Trust for America's Health. Below the map is a chart listing the most and least religious states.

Most religious states	Least religious states
Mississippi	Vermont
Alabama	New Hampshire
South Carolina	Maine
Tennessee	Massachusetts
Louisiana	Alaska
Arkansas	Washington
Georgia	Oregon
Oklahoma	Rhode Island
Kentucky (tie)	Nevada
Texas (tie)	Connecticut

Only one of the least religious states, Alaska, falls into one of the two fattest categories.

All of the most religious states fall into the two fattest categories.

Those Southern Christians should spend some time in the gym instead of bellying up to the church potluck after Sunday services.







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