London: Obesity is no longer confined to India’s prosperous elite, as more than one in four middle-aged Indians in the low and middle income group now has unhealthy midriff bulge, according to a new study.
This means that obesity has trickled down to all levels of society, fuelled partly by India’s rapid economic growth in recent years, suggest the researchers of the study published in the journal BMJ Open.
The researchers base their findings on a nationally representative survey of more than 7,000 people in 2010 from 6 Indian states — Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, Assam, Maharashtra, and Karnataka.
The study was auth-ored by Sudipta Samal and Ambarish Dutta of Asian Institute of Public Health in Odisha and Pinaki Panigrahi from the University of Nebraska Medical Centre in the US. The survey, which included measurements of height, weight, waist circumference, and blood pressure, was part of the international Study on global Ageing and adult health, and involved only those aged 50 and above.
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