Dr Amanda Wong Powell presents the statistics around obesity in the UK and internationally
Obesity and being overweight are the number five cause of death globally, causing 2.8 million adult deaths annually.1,2 One in four adults are now classed as obese, and worldwide obesity has nearly doubled since 1980.1,2 The World Health Organisation (WHO) classifies a person as overweight if they have a body mass index (BMI: kg/m2) of more than 25, and a person as obese if their BMI is more than 30. The obese group is further classified into Class I: moderately obese with a BMI of 30-35, Class II: severely obese with a BMI of 35-40 and Class III: very severely obese with a BMI of more than 40. Although BMI is a very acceptable method of measuring obesity, it does not differentiate between mass due to fat or muscle. Hence, waist circumference is also another method used to measure obesity. A…
