Research
Energy balance
Global obesity prevalence has increased significantly and now exceeds underweight prevalence in the vast majority of countries, creating a 'double burden' of malnutrition driven by rising obesity rather than persistent undernutrition.
Focus on healthy nutrition transitions that enhance access to nutritious foods. Address the remaining burden of underweight while curbing and reversing the increase in obesity.
StrongSupportsVERY_HIGH confidence
In almost all countries for both adults and school-aged children and adolescents, the increases in double burden were driven by increases in obesity, and decreases in double burden by declining underweight or thinness.
Why this rating
Pooled analysis of 3663 population-representative studies with 222 million participants using Bayesian hierarchical modeling.
Source
Worldwide trends in underweight and obesity from 1990 to 2022: a pooled analysis of 3663 population-representative studies with 222 million children, adolescents, and adults
Nowell H Phelps et al. · The Lancet · 2024
DOI 10.1016/s0140-6736(23)02750-2
Meta-analysis · 3663 studiesCited 1,940×
Read the paper DOI resolved against Crossref · corpus check 2026-06-10
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