Is the evil of the century called “obesity”? We are entitled to ask the question in view of a recent study published in The Lancet On March 3, 2025. Indeed, it evokes alarming predictions for 2050 where one could see more than half of adults and a third of children/adolescents worldwide be in a situation of obesity or overweight.
A massive explosion in the number of cases of obesity since the 1990s
The first step to establish predictions is to look at the evolution over a given period. This allows you to get an idea of what the future will look like. Thus, the study begins by explaining the number of cases of obesity people exploded in the space of 30 years.
In fact, in 1991, it was described that the number of adults aged 25 or over in obesity was 731 million and 198 million for children between the ages of 5 and 24. 30 years later, in 2021, obese adults represented 2.11 billion people when the children were 493 million.
A critical situation described as an important failure by the main author of the study, Professor Emmanuela Gakidou of the University of Washington.
“” “The unprecedented global epidemic of overweight and obesity is a deep tragedy and a monumental failure. she said in comments reported by Medical Xpress.
Before adding that governments had to take responsibility in prevention strategies on persons in obesity or overweight or persons at risk.
2050, more than half of adults in the world will be obese
And to be even more precise, the researcher has also been able to estimate the number of adults that this would concern. If today, the number of adults in obesity is estimated at just over 2 billion.
In 2050, the researcher calculated that this figure would climb to 3.8 billion people. Or 60% of the adult population worldwide and almost half of the world's world population.
As for children and adolescents, situations of obesity could be valued at 746 million.
A global emergency which therefore induces an implementation of several policies to stem this phenomenon. It remains to be seen whether the prevention strategies will be able to counter this “deep tragedy”.
Source : Medical Xpress
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