Over the past three decades there has been a major increase in global obesity rates.
A Global Burden of Disease Study suggests the amount of obese and overweight adults had increased by 28 percent in the past 33 years; the rate increased by 47 percent in children, a Morning Post Exchange news release reported.
The highest spikes in obesity rate in women over recent decades have been in "Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Honduras and Bahrain, and among men in New Zealand, Bahrain, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and the USA," the news release reported.
In high-income countries some of the highest elevations in obesity rate have been in the United States , Australia, and the United Kingdom.
"Unlike other major global health risks, such as tobacco and childhood nutrition, obesity is not decreasing worldwide. Our findings show that increases in the prevalence of obesity have been substantial, widespread, and have arisen over a short time. However, there is some evidence of a plateau in adult obesity rates that provides some hope that the epidemic might have peaked in some developed countries and that populations in other countries might not reach the very high rates of more than 40 [percent] reported in some developing countries," Professor Emmanuela Gakidou from the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington, said in the news release.
The researchers believe these statistics call for governments across the globe to take action in fighting obesity.
"The solution has to be mainly political and the questions remain, as with climate change, where is the international will to act decisively in a way that might restrict economic growth in a competitive world, for the public's health? Nowhere yet, but voluntary salt reduction might be setting a more achievable trend. Politicians can no longer hide behind ignorance or confusion," Professor Klim McPherson of Oxford University said in the news release.
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