You are gladly ignoring lots of differences in the diet between Southern Europe and the US. From the size of portions, to the prevalence to HFCS in the American diet, the dramatic difference in consumption of things like olive oil, wine, or beer , the consumption of soft drinks with the main meals of the day, etc. Americans consume signifcantly more Coca Cola than say the Italians, Spaniards or French. Guess what happens then?

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3828681/

> Results. Soft drink consumption increased globally from 9.5 gallons per person per year in 1997 to 11.4 gallons in 2010. A 1% rise in soft drink consumption was associated with an additional 4.8 overweight adults per 100 (adjusted B; 95% confidence interval [CI] = 3.1, 6.5), 2.3 obese adults per 100 (95% CI = 1.1, 3.5), and 0.3 adults with diabetes per 100 (95% CI = 0.1, 0.8). These findings remained robust in low- and middle-income countries.