Quantifying the prevalence and risk of obesity co-morbidities

Figure below shows the prevalence of co-morbidities in men and women of varying BMI ranges. Notice that for men with a BMI from 30-34.9, the prevalence of heart disease is 16.1%. This is nearly twice that of the healthy BMI group, which had a prevalence of 8.8%. A nearly 3x increase in prevalence was seen in women with BMI greater than 40, having a prevalence of 19.2% relative to 6.9% of the 18.5-24.9 BMI group.

Additionally, with obesity comes an increased risk for a number of co-morbidities as seen in Figure below. We can see that the risk for type 2 diabetes is 6x greater in those with extreme obesity (BMI > 35) relative to a person with healthy weight. Furthermore, disease with high mortality rates such as hypertension, stroke, and heart disease see at least a two-fold risk increase.