The Cost of Small Derrières!

A report by France's National Institute of Demographic Studies (INSEE) compared body mass indexes in western Europe and found French women had the lowest average body mass index, at 23.2.

This will not really be a surprise to any one who's travaled around the world but the funny twist is that, as The Independent notices :

The typical French woman is slim and thinks that she is fat. The typical British woman is plump but is convinced that she is thin.

Of course, the question may be: are French women thinner precisely because they worry about their weight and conversely are the British women fatter because they don't?

On the other hand, isn't it better to be fat and happy than thin and stressed? Well, it depends... Another study found that being overweight is bad for the planet.

The researchers from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine say overweight people cause excess greenhouse gas emissions because they eat more than thin people and are more likely to travel by car. (CTV)

Some suggest we should even go back to the 1970s lifetyle.... (without the bell-bottomes, let's hope..)

As for the European men :

Unsurprisingly, the research found that men across the EU are less concerned with their weight than women. Only French and Dutch men are, on average, within the ideal weight band.

Phew!

As for the American men and women, I won't even go there.... ;-)