Overweight & obesity
at a glance

Based on WHO’s global estimation¹, the world population is becoming fatter and obesity has become an epidemic. With the widely available fast food and convenient food, we are living in an “obesogenic” (tendency to make individuals fat) environment that has complicated the situation.

In 2005, approximately 1.6 billion adults were overweight and at least 400 million adults were obese. By 2015, WHO further projects that approximately 2.3 billion adults will be overweight and more than 700 million will be obese. In a world dominated by sedentary pursuits and convenience foods, health experts are increasingly concerned about weight problems in young people. Alarming statistics are being reported, such as the classification of one six-year-old in ten as obese in the UK.

In the UK alone, there are over 30,000 deaths a year caused by obesity. The situation is worse in the US where there are over 300,000 deaths caused by obesity in 2004. (Source: The burden of obesity)


¹http://www.phaster.com/unpretentious/bmi.html

There are several medical conditions where overweight and obesity are known risk factors.
These include the following: