Further damning evidence on growing obesity rates

Obesity continued to increase dramatically during the late 1990s forAmericans of all ages, with nearly one-third of all adults now classified asobese, according to new data from the 1999-2000 National Health andNutrition Examination Survey published yesterday in the Journal of the American Medical Association​.

The data show that 31 per cent of adults aged 20 and over (nearly59 million people) have a Body Mass Index (BMI) of 30 or greater, comparedto 23 per cent in 1994, according to the data collected and analysed by theUS' National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS), part of HHS' Centers forDisease Control and Prevention (CDC).

Meanwhile, the percentage of children who are overweight (defined asBMI-for-age at or above the 95th percentile of the CDC Growth Charts) alsocontinues to increase, the evidence shows. Among children and teenagers aged six to 19, 15 per cent(almost 9 million) are overweight according to the 1999-2000 data, or triplethe proportion in 1980.

"The problem keeps getting worse,"​ said HHS Secretary Tommy G. Thompson. "We've seen virtually a doubling in the number of obese persons over the past two decades and this has profound health implications. Obesity increases a person's risk for a number of serious conditions, includingdiabetes, heart disease, stroke, high blood pressure and some types ofcancer."​

The findings show more adult women are obese (33 per cent) than men (28per cent), with the problem greatest among non-Hispanic black women (50per cent) compared to 40 per cent of Mexican-American women and 30 per cent of non-Hispanic white women. There was practically no difference in obesity levels among men based on race/ethnicity, according to the research.

Most worrying was that over 10 per cent of younger pre-school-aged children betweenaged between two and five are overweight, up from 7 per cent in 1994.

"One of the most significant concerns from a public health perspective isthat we know a lot of children who are overweight grow up to be overweightor obese adults, and thus at greater risk for some major health problemssuch as heart disease and diabetes,"​ said CDC director Dr Julie Gerberding.

"One critical answer to this problem is that we all must work together tohelp our children make physical activity a life-long habit."​

Ethnicity also influenced the data on children with non-Hispanic black and Mexican-American adolescents aged 12-19 morelikely to be overweight than non-Hispanic white teenagers.

The data show that another 15 per cent of children and teensaged six to 19 are considered at risk of becoming overweight (a BMI-for-agefrom the 85th to the 95th percentile).

More information on the study is available on the CDC/NCHS website​.