New Delhi:

Obesity at the time of cancer diagnosis in children may affect the survival rates, according to a study on Monday.

Over 390 million children and adolescents aged 5-19 years were overweight in 2022, including 160 million who were living with obesity, as per data from the World Health Organization (WHO). Obesity is a known precursor to many non-communicable diseases like diabetes, hypertension, and cancer.

“Our study highlights the negative impact of obesity among all types of childhood cancers. It provides the rationale to evaluate different strategies to mitigate the adverse risk of obesity on cancer outcomes in future trials,” said Thai Hoa Tran from the Centre Hospitalier Universitaire Sainte-Justine in Montreal, Canada.

The team conducted a retrospective study on 11,291 children newly diagnosed with cancer from 2001 to 2020, across Canada.

Of these children, aged 2 to 18 years, 10.5 per cent were obese at the time of diagnosis.

Compared with patients without obesity at the time of initial cancer diagnosis, those with obesity had lower rates of 5-year event-free survival (77.5 per cent versus 79.6 per cent) and overall survival (83.0 per cent versus 85.9 per cent).

After adjusting for factors including age, sex, ethnicity, neighborhood income quintile, treatment era, and cancer categories, the team found that obesity at diagnosis was linked with a 16 per cent increase in the risk of relapse. There was also a 29 per cent increase in the risk of death, revealed the study, published in the journal Cancer.

The negative impact of obesity on prognosis was especially pronounced in patients with acute lymphoblastic leukemia and brain tumours, said the team.

The study “also reinforces the urgent need to reduce the epidemic of childhood obesity as it can result in significant health consequences,” Tran said.

(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

“Obesity is emerging as a serious concern among India’s adult population,” said Economic Survey, which was tabled on July 22 by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in the Parliament.
| Photo Credit: The Hindu

Raising concerns over growing obesity and increase of consumption of highly processed foods laden with sugars and fat, the Economic Survey said 54% of the total disease burden in India is due to unhealthy diets.

“Obesity presents a “concerning situation” and preventive measures must be taken to enable citizens to have a healthier lifestyle,” it said.

Economic Survey 2023-24 updates

“Obesity is emerging as a serious concern among India’s adult population,” said the Survey, which was tabled on July 22 by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in the Parliament.

If India needs to “reap the gains of its demographic dividend, it is critical that its population’s health parameters transition towards a balanced and diverse diet”, it said.

Citing a report from the Indian Council for Medical Research, the Economic Survey observed that the rise in consumption of highly processed foods laden with sugars and fat, coupled with reduced physical activity and limited access to diverse foods, exacerbate micronutrient deficiencies and overweight/obesity problems.

“Estimates show that the adult obesity rate in India has more than tripled and the rise in children is the steepest in the world for India, behind Vietnam and Namibia,” the survey stated, referring to a World Obesity Federation report.

The survey further said as per National Family Health Survey (NFHS), the incidence of obesity is significantly higher in urban India than in rural India. In urban India, it is 29.8% in men versus 19.3% of rural India.

The percentage of men facing obesity in the 18-69 age bracket has increased to 22.9% in NFHS-5 from 18.9% in NFHS-4. For women, it has increased from 20.6% (NFHS-4) to 24% (NFHS-5).

“Combined with an aging population in some States, obesity presents a concerning situation. Preventive measures must be taken to enable citizens to have a healthier lifestyle,” the survey said.

In some States, such as in the NCT (Delhi), the proportion of women with obesity is 41.3%, as against 38% for men. In Tamil Nadu, for men, obesity is 37% and it is 40.4% for women. In Andhra, it is 36.3% for women while for men it is 31.1%.

New research finds around a quarter of Labrador retriever dogs face a double-whammy of feeling hungry all the time and burning fewer calories due to a genetic mutation. This obesity-driving combination means that dog owners must be particularly strict with feeding and exercising their Labradors to keep them slim. The mutation is in a gene (POMC), which plays a critical role in hunger and energy use. Around 25% of Labradors and 66% of flatcoated retriever dogs have this mutation, which researchers previously showed causes increased interest in food and risk of obesity. The study reveals how the mutation profoundly changes the way Labradors and flatcoated retrievers behave around food. It found that although they don’t need to eat more to feel full, they are hungrier in between meals. The mutation was found to alter a pathway in the dogs’ brains associated with body weight regulation. The mutation triggers a starvation signal that tells their body to increase food intake and conserve energy, despite this being unnecessary. In addition, dogs with the POMC mutation were found to use around 25% less energy at rest than dogs without it, meaning they don’t need to consume as many calories to maintain a healthy body weight.

New Delhi:

Obesity among children in India has spiked sharply with about 12.5 million of those between the ages of five and 19 overweight in 2022 compared to 0.4 million in 1990, according to a global analysis published in The Lancet journal.

Of the 12.5 million, 7.3 million were boys and 5.2 million girls.

The total number of children, adolescents and adults worldwide living with obesity has surpassed one billion. These trends, together with the declining prevalence of people who are underweight since 1990, make obesity the most common form of malnutrition in most countries, the researchers said.

Obesity and underweight are both forms of malnutrition and are detrimental to people’s health in many ways. The latest study provides a highly detailed picture of global trends in both forms of malnutrition over the last 33 years.

The analysis by the NCD Risk Factor Collaboration (NCD-RisC) — a global network of scientists — and the World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that among the world’s children and adolescents, the rate of obesity in 2022 was four times the rate in 1990.

“It is very concerning that the epidemic of obesity that was evident among adults in much of the world in 1990 is now mirrored in school-aged children and adolescents,” said senior author Professor Majid Ezzati, from Imperial College London in the UK.

“At the same time, hundreds of millions are still affected by undernutrition, particularly in some of the poorest parts of the world. To successfully tackle both forms of malnutrition it is vital we significantly improve the availability and affordability of healthy, nutritious foods,” Ezzati said.

Among adults, the global obesity rate more than doubled in women and nearly tripled in men. In total, 159 million children and adolescents and 879 million adults were living with obesity in 2022, according to the study.

In India, adult obesity rate increased from 1.2 per cent in 1990 to 9.8 per cent in 2022 for women and 0.5 per cent to 5.4 per cent for men. Nearly 44 million women and 26 million men had obesity in 2022.

Between 1990 and 2022, the proportion of the world’s children and adolescents who were affected by underweight fell by around one-fifth in girls and more than one-third in boys. The proportion of the world’s adults who were affected by being underweight more than halved over the same period.

The obesity rate increased from 0.1 per cent in 1990 to 3.1 per cent in 2022 for girls and 0.1 per cent to 3.9 per cent in 2022 for boys.

The researchers analysed weight and height measurements from over 220 million people aged five years or older (63 million people aged five to 19 years, and 158 million aged 20 years or older), representing more than 190 countries.

Over 1,500 researchers contributed to the study, which looked at body mass index (BMI) to understand how obesity and underweight have changed worldwide from 1990 to 2022.

From 1990 to 2022, global obesity rates more than quadrupled in girls and boys, with increases seen in almost all countries, the study found.

The proportion of underweight girls fell from 10.3 per cent in 1990 to 8.2 per cent in 2022, and for boys, it fell from 16.7 per cent to 10.8 per cent, the researchers said.

Among girls, a decrease in the rates of underweight was detected in 44 countries, whilst among boys, a decrease was noted in 80 countries, they said.

The total number of children and adolescents who were affected by obesity in 2022 was nearly 160 million (65 million girls and 94 million boys), compared to 31 million in 1990. Whereas 77 million girls and 108 million boys were underweight in 2022, decreasing from 81 million for girls and 138 million for boys in 1990.

In adults, obesity rates more than doubled among women and nearly tripled in men between 1990 and 2022. The proportion of adults who were underweight halved between 1990 and 2022.

In all age groups, the combined burden of both forms of malnutrition increased in most countries between 1990 and 2022, driven by increasing obesity rates.

However, the double burden of malnutrition declined in many countries in South and Southeast Asia, and in some countries in Africa for men, where the rate of underweight fell steeply.

“The impact of issues such as climate change, disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, and the war in Ukraine risk worsening both rates of obesity and underweight, by increasing poverty and the cost of nutrient-rich foods,” said Guha Pradeepa, study co-author from the Madras Diabetes Research Foundation.

“The knock-on effects of this are insufficient food in some countries and households and shifts to less healthy foods in others. To create a healthier world, we need comprehensive policies to address these challenges,” Pradeepa said..

In total, an estimated nearly 880 million adults were living with obesity in 2022 (504 million women and 374 million men), four and a half times the 195 million recorded in 1990 (128 million women and 67 million men), the researchers said.

Combined with the 159 million children living with obesity in 2022, this is a total of over one billion people affected by obesity in 2022.

Despite global population growth, 183 million women and 164 million men were affected by underweight in 2022, 45 million and 48 million fewer, respectively, than in 1990.

Overall, these trends have led to a transition where in most countries, a larger number of people are affected by obesity than being underweight.

In 2022, obesity rates were higher than rates of underweight for girls and boys in around two thirds of the world’s countries (133 countries for girls and 125 countries for boys).

“This new study highlights the importance of preventing and managing obesity from early life to adulthood, through diet, physical activity, and adequate care, as needed,” said WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, .

“Getting back on track to meet the global targets for curbing obesity will take the work of governments and communities, supported by evidence-based policies from WHO and national public health agencies. Importantly, it requires the cooperation of the private sector, which must be accountable for the health impacts of their products,” Ghebreyesus said in a statement.
 

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)