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The Global Pandemic of Overweight and Obesity

Addressing a Twenty-First Century Multifactorial Disease

  • Living reference work entry
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Handbook of Global Health

Abstract

According to the World Health Organization, overweight and obesity are defined as “abnormal or excessive fat accumulation that presents a risk to health.” Dramatic increases in obesity prevalence, measured on a population basis as BMI >30 kg/m2, were first observed in high-income countries in the late 1980s. Since then, rates of overweight and obesity have also risen significantly in low- and middle-income countries, particularly in urban settings, and the chronic relapsing disease of obesity is now considered a pandemic.

Overweight and obesity are caused by disordered energy balance regulation that produces excess body fat storage. This in turn produces morbidity by both the burden of fat mass and the lipotoxic products of abnormal fat depots, especially those in the muscle, liver, pancreas, and heart. Obesity is thus a disease and a driver of many of the noncommunicable diseases such diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, and cancer. While many approaches have been tried to address obesity, with small and isolated successes in terms of sustained and replicable population-based approaches, global overweight and obesity prevalence continue to rise and are recognized as one of the world’s major public health challenges. Over three million people die each year as a result of overweight and obesity, surpassing the number who die of underweight. There are two billion people worldwide with obesity or its antecedent, overweight, including 124 million children), and these numbers are projected to continue to increase. This chapter examines obesity both as a disease (one that affects virtually all countries and increasingly all age groups) and as a risk factor for other diseases. The latter includes prevention of obesity, primarily through a focus on children. The chapter also provides an overview of treatment options and the ways in which obesity is currently addressed within health systems in different parts of the world, as well as established standards and new discoveries to help those already presenting with obesity. With Latin America as an example, consideration will be given to global and national policies and standards to address the determinants and drivers of overweight and obesity in low- and middle-income countries.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Pennington Biomedical Research Center, Baton Rouge, LA, USA

    Donna Ryan

  2. Instituto Nacional de Salud Pública, Mexico DF, Mexico

    Simon Barquera

  3. World Obesity Federation, London, UK

    Olivia Barata Cavalcanti & Johanna Ralston

Authors
  1. Donna Ryan
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  2. Simon Barquera
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  3. Olivia Barata Cavalcanti
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  4. Johanna Ralston
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Johanna Ralston .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Epidemiology and Preventive Medicine, Monash University, Melbourne, VIC, Australia

    Robin Haring

  2. Global Health Programme, Graduate Institute of International and, Geneva, Switzerland

    Ilona Kickbusch

  3. Charite-Univ.-Med. Berlin, Berlin, Berlin, Germany

    Detlev Ganten

  4. Africa, Brazzaville, Rep of the Congo, World Health Organization Regional Offic, Brazzaville, Congo, Demographic Republic (Zaire)

    Matshidiso Moeti

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Ryan, D., Barquera, S., Barata Cavalcanti, O., Ralston, J. (2020). The Global Pandemic of Overweight and Obesity. In: Haring, R., Kickbusch, I., Ganten, D., Moeti, M. (eds) Handbook of Global Health. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-05325-3_39-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-05325-3_39-1

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  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-05325-3

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-05325-3

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