Obesity is increasing more rapidly in the world’s rural areas than in cities, according to a new study of global trends in body-mass index (BMI). The research, led by Imperial College London and published in Nature, analysed the height and weight data of more than 112 million adults across urban and rural areas of 200 countries and territories between 1985 and 2017.

Growing up, I was never happy with my body. While I can look back and say I was a completely normal, healthy girl; young peers are unforgiving, and the social stigma of poverty conspired with my rapidly developing body to make me a perfect target for cruel bullying. I remember starting my first diet when I was 12.

You probably don't know second leading cause of cancer, because the scientists have only recently made the connection.  It's obesity.

On any given day, 1 in 5 American youngsters don't drink any water at all, a new survey shows -- and those who don't end up consuming almost twice as many calories from sugar-sweetened beverages.

There are, undoubtedly, many factors that go into a person’s weight. A new report from the lab of Sekar Kathiresan, M.D., director of the Center for Genomic Medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital, documents a clear biologic basis for the predisposition of obesity. More specifically, that genetics play a role in how heavy a person gets.

A new report says food companies are pursuing profit at the expense of public and environmental health. That has to change. Obesity, climate change, and malnutrition are among the greatest global crises facing our world today. Wouldn’t it be great if there were solutions to tackle all three problems at once? That might sound far-fetched. But a new report, published Sunday in the Lancet, implores us to think about the possibility of big, systemic fixes for these interrelated scourges.

Scientists say they have discovered the secret behind why some people are skinny while others pile on the pounds easily. Their work reveals newly discovered genetic regions linked to being very slim. The international team say this supports the idea that, for some people, being thin has more to do with inheriting a "lucky" set of genes than having a perfect diet or lifestyle. The study appears in PLOS Genetics.

Even animals that aren’t eating too much or exercising too little are getting fat. If we can figure out why, we may have the key to our own obesity crisis – and how to stop it.

New research from Harvard University finds that Americans' unconscious bias on the basis of sexual orientation and race dropped dramatically over a decade. The study in the journal Psychological Science looks at more than 4 million online tests for implicit bias — bias people aren't aware of — taken from 2007 to the end of 2016.

In this original animated video, anthropological research helps reveal the surprising story behind fat in the human body and in cultures around the world.

It’s a fact: poverty and obesity are intimately connected. But this relationship is only about 30 years old, according to a new study coauthored by UT researchers and published in Palgrave Communications, an open-access, online journal. “We found that the relationship between low income and high rates of adult obesity in the U.S. is not observable until the early 1990s,” said Alex Bentley, head of UT Department of Anthropology and coauthor of the study. “As recently as 1990, this was not a detectable problem,”

Only bariatric surgery reliably leads to long-term weight loss. Now scientists hope to duplicate the effects with a pill.

​An exciting new study has demonstrated how a new kind of CRISPR technique can increase the expression of certain genes, instead of the more traditional approach of cutting or editing DNA. The method was tested in mice, targeting genes associated with hunger, and stopped the animals becoming obese.​

Children mirror the weight gain and losses of their mothers but not their fathers, a study has found.

Our weight might not be controlled solely by what we eat. When we eat, and when we get to sleep, may be just as important. A small study published this week in Current Biology found people who had been thrown off their circadian rhythms burn more calories in the late afternoon and evening hours than in the morning, when calorie burn is at its lowest. Later in the day, calorie burn increases by 10 percent, or about 129 calories.

Obesity is set to overtake smoking as the biggest preventable cause of cancer in UK women by 2043, a Cancer Research UK report predicts. Currently, 12% of cancers in women are linked to smoking, and 7% to being overweight and obese. But with the number of smokers falling and obesity rates projected to rise, the charity estimates that gap will disappear in 25 years time. The figures assume that current trends will continue.

A weight-loss pill has been hailed as a potential “holy grail” in the fight against obesity after a major study showed it did not increase the risk of serious heart problems. Researchers say lorcaserin is the first weight-loss drug to be deemed safe for heart health with long-term use. Taken twice a day, the drug is an appetite suppressant which works by stimulating brain chemicals to induce a feeling of fullness.

Nearly half of adults in America tried to lose weight within the span of a year, according to 2013-2016 data reported in a first-of-its-kind report.

A study of travel habits in seven European cities has found that people who ride their bikes daily have the lowest body mass index (BMI) of any class of transport user – unless the bicycle in question is an electric one, in which case they rank second only to motorists in terms of obesity levels.

The obesity epidemic could be fuelling Britain’s growing problem of loneliness, scientists believe, after discovering a genetic link between the two conditions. Around a quarter of people over 65 in Britain suffer from loneliness, which can raise the risk of many diseases, and can even cause people to die earlier, while nearly two thirds are overweight.