Obesity is Costly

Posted on November 16, 2006 by Gerald Pugliese
You don’t need to be a doctor to know that obesity and carrying excess weight isn’t healthy. Read the news, you’ll see diabetes, heart disease, and high blood pressure, all risks of being overweight, but, it can also be pretty expensive—and I’m not talking about all the pricey junk food. According to Emma Ross-Thomas of Reuters obesity can really wallop a country’s gross domestic product:
Dr. Meera Shekar, senior nutrition specialist with the World Bank, says malnutrition slices 2 to 3 percent off gross domestic product in the hardest-hit countries, and obesity could cost the same.


"We suspect that these estimates will be just as high," she said at a WHO-sponsored conference on obesity in Istanbul.
Dr. Shekar notes obesity cost France $12.1 billion in 1992 and California $22 billion in 2000. Kind of amazing, don't you think?
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