According to new research from Statistics Canada, younger adults are getting heavier, earlier in life, when compared to previous generations. Notably, they say this has implications for health outcomes later in life: Regardless of respondent’s current obesity status, large weight fluctuations and having had obesity in the past increases a person’s health risks.
Increased risk of diabetes
Those who had a healthy weight at the time of the survey, but who had obesity at one point in their past, had an increased risk of having type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure and poor or fair overall general health. Broken down, these clients have a 3.3 times higher risk of developing type 2 diabetes, a 2.4 times higher risk of developing high blood pressure and two times the risk of having poor overall general health. Those with obesity at the time of the survey had a 5.4 times higher risk of having type 2 diabetes, a 3.8 times higher risk of having high blood pressure and a 2.7 times higher risk of having poor overall general health.
“The percentage of respondents with an obesity-related chronic condition was lower among those who did not have obesity at the time of the survey or report having obesity in the past (50.6 per cent) compared with those who did not have obesity at the time of the survey but did in the past (65.9 per cent) or those who had obesity at the time of the survey (71.1 per cent),” they write. “Having had obesity in the past, regardless of current obesity status, was associated with increased odds of poor health outcomes.”
Obesity prevalence
As for the prevalence of obesity, the study further found that nine per cent of Canadians were obese in 1981, 27.2 per cent had obesity in 2018 and the most recent estimates from 2022 suggest that 30 per cent of Canadians today are obese.
“The trajectory of body weight across the lifespan is important to consider when assessing risk for developing disease later in life,” they write. “While improvements in cardiovascular disease are evident after weight loss, studies have shown that some arterial damage persists.” As for those who’ve experienced a major weight fluctuation in their lifetime, the study suggests these adults have a 1.6 times higher risk of having mobility or musculoskeletal problems, such as arthritis, later in life.
“Except for mental health, there was a higher proportion of respondents with negative health outcomes if they had a history of obesity, regardless of whether or not they were obese at the time of the survey,” they write.
