Global Institute’s economic analysis of the social burdens generated by human beings. Obesity is one of the top three social burdens.
(Source: Reproduced from Dobbs et al. [79].)
Thinking about the economics of obesity is valuable as it alters the frame for decision‐making. Thus, for example, the prevention of childhood obesity, although valuable in itself, does not have a significant impact in preventing the cost of diabetes for about 40 years, whereas a marked reduction in overweight/adults with obesity by getting adults to lose at least 15% of their weight leads to a rapid economic gain as set out by the UK’s Chief Scientist’s inquiry into obesity [77]. This finding has been amplified by Lean and others’ new demonstration of the marked impact on diabetes of inducing at least a 15% weight loss with continuous very‐low‐calorie diets – 85% of recently diagnosed patients with diabetes return their glucose status to near normal levels [78].
Finally, the overall societal costs of overweight and obesity have been assessed on a global basis by the McKinsey Global Institute [79]. Their overview is summarized in Figure 1.6, which reveals the global costs of about $2 trillion per year – nearly equivalent to the cost of all global warfare and terrorism as well as the cost of smoking.
Conclusions
Although obesity has been recognized for millennia as a clinical syndrome, it is only since the 1980s that there has been an explosion of cases worldwide linked to dramatic industrial developments. The burden for physicians is overwhelming, and overweight and obesity per se now constitutes a grave economic and medical burden. This is why radical approaches are now needed to reduce the clinical consequences.
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