Senator Eliot Shapleigh - El Paso, Texas

Folks, we're getting fatter than ever.

So are our kids.

Despite all the talk about diet and exercise, obesity rates went up in 31 states last year, according to the Trust for America's Health, a nonprofit organization fixated on the nation's expanding waistline.

Texas had the 12th-highest obesity rate – 26.3 percent of its adult population – up from 25.8 percent in 2004 and tying it with Missouri. The national obesity rate was just over 20 percent.

The obesity report card was not much better for Texas children, whose comparative weights were released for the first time.

Texas had the sixth-highest rate for obese children between ages 10 and 17.

The rate was 19.1 percent, compared with the highest, 22.8 percent in the District of Columbia, and the lowest, 8.5 percent in Utah.

Jeffrey Levi, executive director of the trust, said the growing girth of Americans and their children should be shocking enough to trigger a national strategy to combat obesity. But none has been forthcoming, he complained.

"Everyone believes this is an epidemic," Mr. Levi said, "but it's not getting the level of political and policymaker attention that it ought to."

Mississippi had the highest obesity rate at 30.6 percent of adults, while Colorado had the lowest, 17.6 percent.

Dr. Amit Khera, who treats obese cardiac patients at UT Southwestern Medical Center, said the U.S. needs a comprehensive strategy for fighting obesity much like the anti-smoking campaigns of a generation past.

"It took leadership from a national stage, including a surgeon general's report, for changes to be made in the nation's smoking habits," he said. "But not much has been done yet about obesity from a public health standpoint."

Still, the U.S. obesity trend has caught the attention of medical experts, who say they are sickened by the spectacle of so many obese Americans but at a loss to stop it.

"When I was a kid, you had to go to a sideshow at the circus and pay a dollar to see the fat lady," said Dr. Roger Unger, a UT Southwestern diabetes researcher. "Now, I can see them in the parking lot at the medical center."

Dr. Unger, a professor of internal medicine, wondered if it were even possible for obese adults to change their lifestyles enough to stop gaining weight. Has obesity become so commonplace that people "just buy a new wardrobe instead of going on a diet?" he asked.

Obesity is defined as an excessively high amount of body fat in relation to lean body mass. A person is measured by body mass index, a mathematical comparison of height to weight. A BMI of 30 or greater is considered obese.

Research has shown that people with higher body mass indexes have a greater risk of developing chronic diseases, such as hypertension and diabetes.

But even the threat of obesity-related illnesses does not seem to deter weight gain, Dr. Unger noted. Nor does the discomfort of being oversized.

"It's a horrible disease because people are trapped inside a body they don't want and don't like, and nobody shows them any compassion, not even their doctors," he said. "Everybody just blames them for gaining weight."

Dr. Kenneth Cooper, founder of the Cooper Aerobics Center in Dallas, said he was at a loss to explain the growing obesity of baby boomers who once seemed so committed to exercise and healthy living.

"They quit smoking and were watching their diets and exercising," he said. "But around 1990, they just stopped and started gaining weight. And we've had no success whatsoever in slowing it down."

Although he has long preached the benefits of preventive medicine, including regular exercise, Dr. Cooper said he has nearly concluded that nothing can be done for severely obese adults.

"I hate to say this, but I've given up on the adults," he said. "They just don't want to get in shape and stay that way."

Perhaps the only positive changes in the U.S. obesity outlook are new state efforts targeting the diet and physical activity of schoolchildren.

Texas is one of 17 states now requiring that school lunches, breakfasts and snacks meet higher nutritional standards than set by the federal government. The state also has set nutritional standards for food sold in vending machines and stricter limits on when and where food can be sold on school property.

Dr. Cooper said he was hopeful that Texas' new physical education requirement – the equivalent of 30 minutes per school day – for kindergarten through fifth grade would make a positive difference.

"PE was required by the Legislature years ago, but nobody really did it because there was no testing," he said. "Now, testing will be mandated. I think we've got potential here."

The Associated Press contributed to this report.