Nutrition and the Metabolic Syndrome: A Twenty-First-Century Epidemic of Obesity and Eating Disorders

Lack of sufficient nutrition is the main problem of billions of persons in the underdeveloped world, while excessive caloric intake leading to obesity is becoming more and more prevalent in Western societies of affluence. As a result, obesity, which leads to the metabolic syndrome and is thus closely associated with significant morbidity and mortality from diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, and cancers, to mention a few, is considered the epidemic of our century in Western societies.