Diego Valle-Jones's Bloghttps://blog.diegovalle.net/2010-03-08T00:00:00+01:00Weird dietary habits in the US2010-03-08T00:00:00+01:00Diego Valle-Jonestag:blog.diegovalle.net,2010-03-08:2010/03/weird-dietary-habits-in-us.html<div class="post-body entry-content" itemprop="articleBody">
Using this <a href="http://www.canibaisereis.com/2009/03/21/nutrition-and-health-database/">database</a> of food consumption data the blog <a href="http://www.canibaisereis.com/2009/03/21/nutrition-and-health-database/">Canibais e Reis</a> kindly put together, I calculated all values for which the <span class="caps">US</span> was at least 2 standard deviations from the world average. <br/>
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<a href="/images/blogger_images/4.bp.blogspot.com__q3Caf3YFFAs_S5U2hVFem9I_AAAAAAAAD1k_sIqM7OtsXQU_s1600-h_usa.png" imageanchor="1" ><img border="0" height="200" src="/images/blogger_images/4.bp.blogspot.com__q3Caf3YFFAs_S5U2hVFem9I_AAAAAAAAD1k_sIqM7OtsXQU_s320_usa.png" width="320"/></a></div>
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Here are the outliers in standard deviations from the world mean:</div>
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<table border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" style="width: 400px;" unselectable="on"><tbody>
<tr> <td valign="top" width="307">Poultry.Meat..kcal.day…2003</td> <td valign="top" width="93">2.5 </td></tr>
<tr> <td valign="top" width="307">Soybean.Oil..kcal.day…2003</td> <td valign="top" width="93">4.5 </td></tr>
<tr> <td valign="top" width="307">Sugar…Sweeteners..kcal.day…2003</td> <td valign="top" width="93">2.1 </td></tr>
<tr> <td valign="top" width="307">Sugar..Raw.Equivalent..kcal.day…2003</td> <td valign="top" width="93">2.1 </td></tr>
<tr> <td valign="top" width="307">Vegetable.Oils..kcal.day…2003</td> <td valign="top" width="93">2.1 </td></tr>
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Lots of sugar and Omega 6 fatty acids. <a href="http://blog.diegovalle.net/2009/07/height-and-obesity.html">Not very healthy</a>.</div>
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In case you were wondering, the only weird dietary habit in Mexico is (ahem) a high <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1PHZzf9eAT0">consumption of beans</a>, 3 standard deviations above the world average. Since I suspected maize was also an outlier but it wasn’t included in the database, I downloaded the 2005 data from the <a href="http://faostat.fao.org/site/609/DesktopDefault.aspx?PageID=609#ancor%20"><span class="caps">FAO</span></a> website and indeed, Mexico is also an outlier in maize consumption. I bet if soft drink consumption were tracked, Mexico would also be an outlier.<br/>
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The code is <a href="http://gist.github.com/326839">here</a> and the data is <a href="https://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=tdzqfp-_ypDqUNYnJEq8sgg&single=true&gid=0">here</a></div>
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