Health experts always recommend a healthy lifestyle for maintaining a good shape. Despite the health-related guidelines and large number of awareness programs, the menace of obesity is rising unabatedly, thanks to the unhealthy lifestyle of the people.
A new study has found that obesity problem is not only affection health or inviting new types of diseases but it is also costing the world more than the amount spent on smoking, war or terrorism.
The study, conducted by the McKinsey Global Institute (MGI), has shown that the obesity epidemic is costing the world economy USD 2 trillion per year in health expenses and lower productivity.
The obesity problem is costing almost £47 billion a year to the UK alone, the study showed further. Moreover, obesity claims a financial loss equivalent to gross domestic product (GDP) of Russia.
Elaborating upon the study’s findings, the MGI said, “Today obesity is jostling with armed conflict and smoking in terms of having the greatest human-generated global economic impact.”
A report shows one-third of the population of the world was obese or overweight in 2013.
The MGI study has ranked obesity far more expensive than the problems like alcoholism, air pollution, drug problems and climate change. It only lags behind the smoking and the armed conflicts as far as the most costly human-generated burdens are concerned.
In Britain, the obesity problem is second only to smoking which takes £57 billion annual toll on the country’s economy.
According to the MGI researchers, obesity is a serious global issue that needs urgent and comprehensive intervention from the international community.
Nearly 30 percent or more than 2.1 billion people of the global population suffer from the problem of overweight or obesity.
“That’s almost two-and-a-half times the number of adults and children who are undernourished. Obesity is responsible for about 5 percent of all deaths a year worldwide and its global economic impact amounts to roughly USD 2 trillion annually or 2.8 percent of global GDP — nearly equivalent to the global impact of smoking or of armed violence, war, and terrorism,” the MGI researchers said.
The researchers stress the weight problem is preventable but due to lack of proper and timely intervention the problem is rapidly getting worse.
The findings of the study were detailed in the “Overcoming obesity: An initial economic analysis”.
Share this:
