Abstract
Previous studies on the impact of obesity on life expectancy focused on the United States or a single calendar year. In light of the important differences between European countries in both obesity prevalence and life expectancy over time, our aim was to assess the impact of obesity on long-term trends in life expectancy across a wide range of European countries. We found that, in the 26 European countries studied, the share of mortality due to obesity in 2012 was, on average, 11% among men and 10% among women. The potential gain in life expectancy if obesity-attributable mortality would be eliminated (= PGLE) in 2012 ranged from 0.86 to 1.73 years among men, and from 0.66 to 1.54 years among women. Overall, PGLE increased between 1975 and 2012, albeit more quickly among men (average annual increase: 2.68%) than among women (1.33%). Among women in Denmark, Switzerland, and Eastern Europe the increase in PGLE levelled off after 1995. Without obesity, the average increase in e0 between 1975 and 2012 would have been 0.78 years higher among men and 0.30 years higher among women. Obesity, thus, clearly has a negative impact on both life expectancy levels and trends in Europe. The differences we observed in the impact of obesity across countries and between the sexes can be linked to contextual factors (economic conditions, obesogenic environment, energy supplies), as well as to differences in people’s ability and capacity to adopt healthier lifestyles.
The Chapter is an adaptation of the journal article: Vidra, N., Trias-Llimós, S. and Janssen, F. (2019). Impact of obesity on life expectancy among different European countries: secondary analysis of population-level data over the 1975–2012 period. BMJ Open 9(7): e028086. In addition, input has been used from the popular version of the article: Janssen, F., Vidra, N. and S. Trias-Llimós (2020) Impact of obesity on life expectancy levels and trends in Europe. N-IUSSP: IUSSP’s online news magazine. January 13, 2020. See: https://www.niussp.org/article/impact-of-obesity-on-life-expectancy-levels-and-trends-in-europe/#more-4192
The summary above uses sentences from the original abstract of the article in BMJ Open.
This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution.
Buying options
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Learn about institutional subscriptionsReferences
Alley, D. E., Lloyd, J., & Shardell, M. (2011). Can obesity account for cross-national differences in life expectancy trends? In E. M. Crimmins, S. H. Preston, & B. Cohen (Eds.), International differences in mortality at older ages: Dimensions and sources, panel on understanding divergent trends in longevity in high-income countries (pp. 164–192). National Academies Press.
Barbieri, M., Wilmoth, J. R., Shkolnikov, V. M., Glei, D., Jasilionis, D., Jdanov, D., et al. (2015). Data resource profile: The human mortality database (HMD). International Journal of Epidemiology, 44(5), 1549–1556. https://doi.org/10.1093/ije/dyv105
Berghofer, A., Pischon, T., Reinhold, T., Apovian, C. M., Sharma, A. M., & Willich, S. N. (2008). Obesity prevalence from a European perspective: A systematic review. BMC Public Health, 8(1), 200–210.
Bray, G. A., & Bouchard, C. (2003). Handbook of obesity: Etiology and pathophysiology (2nd ed.). CRC Press Taylor & Francis Group.
Cleveland, W. S., & Loader, C. (1995). Smoothing by local regression: Principles and methods. AT & T Bell Laboratories.
Cutler, D. M., Glaeser, E. L., & Shapiro, J. M. (2003). Why have Americans become more obese? The Journal of Economic Perspectives, 17(1), 93–118.
Doak, C. M., Wijnhoven, T. M., Schokker, D. F., Visscher, T. L., & Seidell, J. C. (2012). Age standardization in mapping adult overweight and obesity trends in the WHO European region. Obesity Reviews: An Official Journal of the International Association for the Study of Obesity, 13(2), 174–191.
Donahue, J. (2018). Obesity in the US and UK. Journal of Nutrition & Food Sciences, 8(4), 1–5.
Eurostat. (2011). Census data. Retrieved from https://ec.europa.eu/CensusHub2/query.do?step=selectHyperCube&qhc=false
Eurostat. (2016). European health interview survey – Almost 1 adult in 6 in the EU is considered obese – Share of obesity increases with age and decreases with education level. Eurostat News Release. Retrieved from http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/documents/2995521/7700898/3-20102016-BP-EN.pdf/c26b037b-d5f3-4c05-89c1-00bf0b98d646
Eurostat. (2017). Overweight and obesity – BMI statistics. Retrieved from http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php/Overweight_and_obesity_-_BMI_statistics
Fagerli, R. A., & Wandel, M. (1999). Gender differences in opinions and practices with regard to a “healthy diet”. Appetite, 32(2), 171–190. S0195-6663(98)90188-X.
Field, A. E., Coakley, E. H., Must, A., Spadano, J. L., Laird, N., Dietz, W. H., et al. (2001). Impact of overweight on the risk of developing common chronic diseases during a 10-year period. Archives of Internal Medicine, 161(13), 1581–1586. ioi00652.
Finucane, M. M., Stevens, G. A., Cowan, M. J., Danaei, G., Lin, J. K., Paciorek, C. J., et al, Global Burden of Metabolic Risk Factors of Chronic Diseases Collaborating Group (Body Mass Index). (2011). National, regional, and global trends in body-mass index since 1980: Systematic analysis of health examination surveys and epidemiological studies with 960 country-years and 9.1 million participants. Lancet, 377(9765), 557–567.
Flegal, K. M., Graubard, B. I., Williamson, D. F., & Gail, M. H. (2005). Excess deaths associated with underweight, overweight, and obesity. JAMA, 293(15), 1861–1867. 293/15/1861.
Flegal, K. M., Panagiotou, O. A., & Graubard, B. I. (2015). Estimating population attributable fractions to quantify the health burden of obesity. Annals of Epidemiology, 25(3), 201–207. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.annepidem.2014.11.010
Global BMI Mortality Collaboration, Di Angelantonio, E., Bhupathiraju, S., Wormser, D., Gao, P., Kaptoge, S., et al. (2016). Body-mass index and all-cause mortality: Individual-participant-data meta-analysis of 239 prospective studies in four continents. Lancet (London, England), 388(10046), 776–786. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(16)30175-1
Human Mortality Database. (2018). University of California, Berkeley (USA), and Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research (Germany). Retrieved from http://www.mortality.org
Janssen, F. (2018). Differences in longevity in Europe. The European Actuary, 8(3), 30–33.
Janssen, F. (2020a). Similarities and differences between sexes and countries in the mortality imprint of the smoking epidemic in 34 low-mortality countries, 1950-2014. Nicotine & Tobacco Research, 22(7), 1210–1220.
Janssen, F. (2020b). The role of smoking in country differences in life expectancy across Europe, 1985-2014. Nicotine & Tobacco Research. https://doi.org/10.1093/ntr/ntaa011
Janssen, F., Rousson, V., & Paccaud, F. (2015). The role of smoking in changes in the survival curve: An empirical study in 10 European countries. Annals of Epidemiology, 25(4), 243–249.
Leon, D. A. (2011). Trends in European life expectancy: A salutary view. International Journal of Epidemiology, 40(2), 271–277. https://doi.org/10.1093/ije/dyr061
Lobstein, T., & Leach, R. J. (2010). Workpackage 7: Overweight and obesity report on data collection for overweight and obesity prevalence and related relative risks. Retrieved from http://www.dynamo-hia.eu/dsresource?type=pdf&disposition=inline&objectid=rivmp:232795&versionid=&subobjectname=
Malik, V. S., Willett, W. C., & Hu, F. B. (2013). Global obesity: Trends, risk factors and policy implications. Nature Reviews. Endocrinology, 9(1), 13–27. https://doi.org/10.1038/nrendo.2012.199
Mehta, N. K., & Chang, V. W. (2011). Secular declines in the association between obesity and mortality in the United States. Population and Development Review, 37(3), 435–451.
Monteiro, C. A., Conde, W. L., Lu, B., & Popkin, B. M. (2004). Obesity and inequities in health in the developing world. International Journal of Obesity and Related Metabolic Disorders, 28(9), 1181–1186. https://doi.org/10.1038/sj.ijo.0802716
National Research Council. (2011). The role of obesity. In E. M. Crimmins, S. H. Preston, & B. Cohen (Eds.), Explaining divergent levels of longevity in high-income countries (pp. 43–55). National Academies Press.
NCD Risk Factor Collaboration. (2016). Trends in adult body-mass index in 200 countries from 1975 to 2014: A pooled analysis of 1698 population-based measurement studies with 19.2 million participants. Lancet (London, England), 387(10026), 1377–1396. S0140-6736(16)30054-X.
OECD. (2012). Obesity update 2012. Retrieved from http://www.oecd.org/els/health-systems/49716427.pdf
Olshansky, S. J., Passaro, D. J., Hershow, R. C., Layden, J., Carnes, B. A., Brody, J., et al. (2005). A potential decline in life expectancy in the United States in the 21st century. The New England Journal of Medicine, 352(11), 1138–1145. 352/11/1138.
Omran, A. R. (1998). The epidemiologic transition theory revisited thirty years later. World Health Statistics Quarterly, 52, 99–119.
Preston, S. H., & Stokes, A. (2011). Contribution of obesity to international differences in life expectancy. American Journal of Public Health, 101(11), 2137–2143. https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2011.300219
Preston, S. H., Heuveline, P., & Guillot, M. (2001). Demography. Blackwell.
Psaltopoulou, T., Hatzis, G., Papageorgiou, N., Androulakis, E., Briasoulis, A., & Tousoulis, D. (2017). Socioeconomic status and risk factors for cardiovascular disease: Impact of dietary mediators. Hellenic Journal of Cardiology: HJC = Hellenike Kardiologike Epitheorese, 58(1), 32–42. S1109-9666(17)30040-4.
Robertson, A., Lobstein, T., & Knai, C. (2007). Obesity and socio-economic groups in Europe: Evidence review and implications for action. European Commission.
Rockhill, B., Newman, B., & Weinberg, C. (1998). Use and misuse of population attributable fractions. American Journal of Public Health, 88(1), 15–19.
Silventoinen, K., Sans, S., Tolonen, H., Monterde, D., Kuulasmaa, K., Kesteloot, H., et al. (2004). Trends in obesity and energy supply in the WHO MONICA project. International Journal of Obesity and Related Metabolic Disorders: Journal of the International Association for the Study of Obesity, 28(5), 710–718. https://doi.org/10.1038/sj.ijo.0802614
Trias-Llimós, S., Kunst, A. E., Jasilionis, D., & Janssen, F. (2018). The contribution of alcohol to the east-west life expectancy gap in Europe from 1990 onward. European Journal of Epidemiology, 47(3), 731–739.
Vallin, J., & Meslé, F. (2004). Convergences and divergences in mortality: A new approach of health transition. Demographic Research, 2(2), 11–44.
Vidra, N., Bijlsma, M. J., & Janssen, F. (2018). Impact of different estimation methods on obesity-attributable mortality levels and trends: The case of The Netherlands. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 15(10), 2146. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph15102146
WHO. (2007). The challenge of obesity in the WHO european region and the strategies for response: Summary. World Health Organization, Regional Office for Europe.
WHO. (2014). Obesity and inequities. Guidance for addressing inequities in overweight and obesity. World Health Organization, Regional Office for Europe.
WHO. (2018). Obesity. Retrieved from http://www.euro.who.int/en/health-topics/noncommunicable-diseases/obesity/obesity
Wilkins, E., Wilson, L., Wickramasinghe, K., Bhatnagar, P., Leal, J., Luengo-Fernandez, R., et al. (2017). European cardiovascular disease statistics 2017. European Heart Network.
Yu, Y. (2012). Reexamining the declining effect of age on mortality differentials associated with excess body mass: Evidence of cohort distortions in the United States. American Journal of Public Health, 102(5), 915–922. https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2011.300237
Yu, Y. (2016). The changing body mass-mortality association in the United States: Evidence of sex-specific cohort trends from three national health and nutrition examination surveys. Biodemography and Social Biology, 62(2), 143–163.
Zatonski, W. A., & Bhala, N. (2012). Changing trends of diseases in Eastern Europe: Closing the gap. Public Health, 126(3), 248–252. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.puhe.2011.11.017
Acknowledgements
The authors are grateful to Professor Majid Ezatti and Dr. James Bentham (Faculty of Medicine, School of Public Health at Imperial College London); Dr. Gretchen A. Stevens (World Health Organization); and the NCD Risk Factor Collaboration (NCD-RisC) (www.ncdrisc.org) for sharing the obesity data.
This work is financed by the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO) as part of the research programme “Smoking, alcohol, and obesity, ingredients for improved and robust mortality projections, grant no. 452-13-001”. See www.futuremortality.com.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2022 Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Vidra, N., Trias-Llimós, S., Janssen, F. (2022). Impact of Obesity on Life Expectancy Among Different European Countries, 1975–2012. In: Garcia-Alexander, G., Poston, Jr., D.L. (eds) International Handbook of the Demography of Obesity. International Handbooks of Population, vol 12. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-10936-2_4
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-10936-2_4
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-031-10935-5
Online ISBN: 978-3-031-10936-2
eBook Packages: Social SciencesSocial Sciences (R0)