Ten percent of the world’s population is now obese, and obesity levels are rising even in countries previously known for food scarcity, says a study designed by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington and funded by the Gates Foundation.
The study, published in the New England Journal of Medicine and based on research conducted in 195 countries, “essentially the world’s population, [found] that rates of obesity at least doubled in 73 countries—including Turkey, Venezuela, and Bhutan—from 1980 to 2015, and ‘continuously increased in most other countries,’ ” says The New York Times.
According to the findings, excess weight was linked to the death of four million people worldwide in 2015, through heart disease, diabetes, kidney disease, and other health issues.
“In the United States, 12.5 percent of children were obese, up from 5 percent in 1980. Combining children and adults, the United States had the dubious distinction of having the largest increase in percentile points of any country, a jump of 16 percentage points to 26.5 percent of the overall population,” says the Times.
“This study shows what we know,” Barry Popkin, a professor of nutrition at the University of North Carolina, told the Times. “No country in the globe has reduced overweight or obesity levels. This is astounding given the huge health and economic costs linked with overweight and obesity.”