Correction of underweight and overweight by exercise

Chapter 34: THE CORRECTION OF UNDERWEIGHT OR MALNUTRITION

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About This Book

This work provides practical guidance for correcting both overweight and underweight through diet and exercise, emphasizing prevention and gradual, safe change under medical supervision. It identifies common causes of excess weight—reduced activity, overeating, and sometimes endocrine factors—and warns against advertised reducing drugs while recommending diets that favor bulky, low-fat foods and regular meals. Exercise advice includes daily calisthenics, brisk walking, outdoor activity, attention to bowel regularity, and hygienic measures such as baths. The section on underweight examines causes of malnutrition and prescribes targeted exercises and dietary adjustments to build weight sensibly, stressing persistence and individualized plans over quick fixes.

THE CORRECTION OF UNDERWEIGHT OR MALNUTRITION

Underweight is of two types; first, pathological, or that kind associated with disease, and second, physiological.

In the pathological type is found the danger sign which is apt to be an actual loss of weight though it may be inability to gain. Any loss of weight which is sudden or gradual should be investigated immediately by a competent physician.

Normal underweight, that is twenty percent below the normal weight, is more desirable than the same degree of overweight, because underweight persons as a class, live longer and are healthier than the overweight class.