Obesity Epidemic is a Threat to Global Health
What are overweight and obesity?
The World Health Organization defines overweight and obesity as “abnormal or excessive fat accumulation that may impair health” (World Health Organization, 2016). Body Mass Index (BMI) is a useful tool to determine whether an individual’s weight can be categorised as normal, overweight or obese compared to other people with the same height. An adult whose BMI score is ≥ 25 is considered overweight and ≥ 30 is considered obese (National Health and Medical Research Council, 2013). It is shocking to know that nearly one-third of the world’s population nowadays fall into either one of these two categories (Murray & Ng, 2016).
Do you know your BMI score? To calculate …show more content…
Overweight and obesity are not just issues of appearance and fitness. They are often associated with many chronic diseases, such as type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease and some cancers. Though obesity is not always the direct cause of these diseases, the risk of these as well as other mental health issues increase with weight gain. Obesity and its complications alter an individual’s health and wellbeing. Also, they are the potential cause for early death. Such fatal and non-fatal burdens affect both the individual and society as a whole. Study shows that overweight and obesity are responsible for approximately 3.4 million deaths, 3.9% of years of life lost, and 3.8% of disability-adjusted life-years (Ng et al., 2014).
Apart from the unfavourable health consequences, the medical costs of overweight and obesity are also overwhelming. The annual economic cost of obesity is estimated at $2 trillion in 2014 (Dobbs et al., 2014). This includes direct costs (e.g. medications, surgery, etc.) and indirect costs (e.g. loss in productivity, insurance, etc.). The costliness of this epidemic is not exclusive to anyone, or in other words people of all ages, sexes and racial groups are at …show more content…
This trend also applies to the U.S.; however, it is not consistent across the whole population. For example, the obesity rate is higher in women with higher income (Malik, Willett & Hu, 2013). Ethnic group is another variation that needs to be taken into account. The obesity prevalence in high SES Mexican–American men is higher compared to the low SES group (Malik, Willett & Hu, 2013). The lower SES groups generally have less choice in many aspects of life, including health care services, living conditions and healthy diet. Therefore, they are more prone to overweight and obesity. However, as shown above even the ones with higher SES are still at great
What are overweight and obesity?
The World Health Organization defines overweight and obesity as “abnormal or excessive fat accumulation that may impair health” (World Health Organization, 2016). Body Mass Index (BMI) is a useful tool to determine whether an individual’s weight can be categorised as normal, overweight or obese compared to other people with the same height. An adult whose BMI score is ≥ 25 is considered overweight and ≥ 30 is considered obese (National Health and Medical Research Council, 2013). It is shocking to know that nearly one-third of the world’s population nowadays fall into either one of these two categories (Murray & Ng, 2016).
Do you know your BMI score? To calculate …show more content…
Overweight and obesity are not just issues of appearance and fitness. They are often associated with many chronic diseases, such as type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease and some cancers. Though obesity is not always the direct cause of these diseases, the risk of these as well as other mental health issues increase with weight gain. Obesity and its complications alter an individual’s health and wellbeing. Also, they are the potential cause for early death. Such fatal and non-fatal burdens affect both the individual and society as a whole. Study shows that overweight and obesity are responsible for approximately 3.4 million deaths, 3.9% of years of life lost, and 3.8% of disability-adjusted life-years (Ng et al., 2014).
Apart from the unfavourable health consequences, the medical costs of overweight and obesity are also overwhelming. The annual economic cost of obesity is estimated at $2 trillion in 2014 (Dobbs et al., 2014). This includes direct costs (e.g. medications, surgery, etc.) and indirect costs (e.g. loss in productivity, insurance, etc.). The costliness of this epidemic is not exclusive to anyone, or in other words people of all ages, sexes and racial groups are at …show more content…
This trend also applies to the U.S.; however, it is not consistent across the whole population. For example, the obesity rate is higher in women with higher income (Malik, Willett & Hu, 2013). Ethnic group is another variation that needs to be taken into account. The obesity prevalence in high SES Mexican–American men is higher compared to the low SES group (Malik, Willett & Hu, 2013). The lower SES groups generally have less choice in many aspects of life, including health care services, living conditions and healthy diet. Therefore, they are more prone to overweight and obesity. However, as shown above even the ones with higher SES are still at great