ABSTRACT
Obesity is an ever-increasing problem in today’s society for both children and adults. The World Health Organization declared obesity as a global epidemic in 1998, recognizing its long-term implications on health. This chapter shows that the current and future health consequences of obesity are grave and varied. Body mass index is the most commonly used index to delineate the prevalence of overweight and obesity in children because of its ease of measurement, but this calculation is likely to underestimate central obesity, a major marker for insulin resistance. Obese children have increasing evidence of insulin resistance, resulting in hyperinsulinemia as a compensating mechanism to maintain euglycemia. Type 2 diabetes mellitus is more strongly associated with obesity in adults than any other medical condition. As Type 2 diabetes occurs with an increased frequency and starts to appear at an ever decreasing age, we face the possibility that, in addition to diabetes, coronary heart disease may become a disease of young adulthood.
