Anorexia or anorexia nervosa is one of the three most common types of eating disorders. People who are suffering from anorexia are afraid of gaining weight and to become fat, and therefore they stop eating. Some also start to work more often and harder than earlier. The reason why many people develop anorexia is because they feel that they don’t succeede in some parts of their lives, and to get the feeling control they start to control their weight. Each year about one thousand people around the world die because of anorexia.
Eating disorders are generally not very common in India, but the last years the number of girls with anorexia has increased. Influence from the West through TV, internet, magazines, commercials and movies might be one reason. Anyway influence form the West are mostly influencing the Indians with a good economy because they are the ones who have supply for these things. While the Indian female ideal has curves and a round figure (as it was in Europe some years ago), the Western ideal is to be slim and fit. The reason why curves and a round figure is a part of the female ideal is because many people in India are struggling to get enough food and therefore a woman who is well-fed is a symbol of status and money.
In both India and UK, anorexia is most common among young people, and there are more
British girls than boys who struggles whit anorexia. Actually as much as 5 % of all British girls have anorexia. Usually anorexia is developed in the middle of the teen ages, and according to The Royal College of Psychiatrists, about 1 percent of all Britons between the age of 16 to18 year have anorexia. Commercials, TV, internet, magazines, skinny models and celebrities and a pressure on having the perfect body might be some reasons on why anorexia is more common in UK than in India.
