Obesity, Physical Activity, Diet
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Abstract
Abstract
and lacks a granular and systematic analysis of its dynamics. We used 4,050 population-based studies with measured height and weight data on 232 million participants to assess the worldwide dynamics of obesity from 1980 to 2024. The rise in obesity decelerated in school-aged children and adolescents throughout the 1990s in many high-income countries, and subsequently plateaued in most at age-standardized prevalences spanning 20 percentage points, from 3-4% for girls in Japan, Denmark and France to 23% for boys in the USA. There were indications of a small decline in obesity in children and adolescents in some high-income western countries (for example, Italy, Portugal and France) since the 2000s. Similar trends were seen in some countries in Central and Eastern Europe. In adults, the rise in obesity slowed down in high-income western countries about a decade after children, followed by a plateau or possibly a small reversal of the rise in some countries (for example, Spain). In most low-income and middle-income countries, the annual absolute change in prevalence has remained stable or increased over time, even though prevalence has surpassed that of high-income countries. These highly varied dynamics suggest that the social, economic and technological trends that influence the availability, affordability and use of different foods may have helped control the rise in obesity in high-income countries, but require policy interventions in low-income and middle-income countries.
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@article{Danaei2026Obesity,
title = {Obesity rise plateaus in developed nations and accelerates in developing nations},
author = {Goodarz Danaei and Kairat Davletov and Shubash Ganapathy and Edward W. Gregg and Nayu Ikeda and Zulfiqar Ahmed Bhutta and Pascal Bovet and André Pascal Kengne and Kamlesh K. Khunti and Young‐Ho Khang and Tiina K. Laatikainen and Avula Laxmaiah and Lee‐Ling Lim and H Y Lin and J Mbanya and J. Jaime Miranda and Anja Schienkiewitz and Sylvain Sebert and Namuna Shrestha and Yi Song and Adrián Soto-Mota and Gregor Starc and L L Wang and Novie O. Younger-Coleman and Francesco Zaccardi and Jamila Abubakar Garba and Benjamín Acosta-Cázares and Ishag Adam and Marzena Adamczyk and Robert J. Adams and Seth Adu‐Afarwuah and Wichai Aekplakorn and Julie Aarestrup and Leandra Abarca-Gómez and Mohsen Abbasi‐Kangevari and Ziad Abdeen and Shynar Abdrakhmanova and Suhaila Abdul Ghaffar and Hanan F. Abdul Rahim and Zulfiya Abdurahmnova and Niveen M. Abu-Rmeileh and Tin Afifah and Kaosar Afsana and Shoaib Afzal and Imelda Angeles‐Agdeppa and Javad Aghazadeh-Attari and Åsa Ågren and Hassan Aguenaou and Ali Ahmadi and Naser Ahmadi and Nastaran Ahmadi and Imran Ahmed and Soheir H. Ahmed and Wolfgang Ahrens and Gulmira Aitmurzaeva and Kamel M. Ajlouni and Dilorom I. Akhmedova and Nilufar Akhmedova and Nasser Al-Daghri and Sarah F Al-Hamli and Hazzaa M. Al-Hazzaa and Halima Al-Hinai and Charles O Agyemang and Mohamad Hasnan Ahmad and Noor Ani Ahmad and Jawad Ahmed Al-Lawati and Rajaa Mohammad Al-Raddadi and Islam K. Al-Shami and Deena Alasfoor and Huda M Al Hourani and Nawal M. Al Qaoud and Monira Alarouj and Fadia S. AlBuhairan and Shahla AlDhukair and Maryam A. Aldwairji and Bin Zhou and Nowell H Phelps and Agnese Galeazzi and Olivia N O'Driscoll and James E. Bennett and Lakshya Jain and Yse D'Ailhaud De Brisis and Ana Barradas‐Pires and Fulvio Deo and Gretchen A Stevens and Vasilis Kontis and Christopher Paciorek and Rodrigo Martin Carrillo-Larco and Anu Mishra and 范晔峰 and Andrea Rodriguez‐Martinez and Vishwa Nath and Archie W. Rayner and Annalise Zouein and Natalie R. Evans and Jennifer L. Baker and Günther Fink and Maroje Sorić and Carlos Alberto Aguilar-Salinas and Ranjit Mohan Anjana},
journal = {Nature},
year = {2026},
doi = {10.1038/s41586-026-10383-0},
url = {https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-026-10383-0}
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