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January 10, 2003
Study Calculates Years of Life Lost Due to Obesity

Baltimore -- Lose weight or lose years of life. That's the message from researchers at Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center.

In a groundbreaking study, published in the January issue of JAMA, researchers at Hopkins Bayview and at the University of Alabama at Birmingham have estimated the expected numbers of years of life lost (YLL) due to obesity across the adult life span, beginning at the age of 20. Although similar studies have been conducted in the past, this is the first study to show the devastating potential effects of obesity, even at early ages when illness and death are not normally the concerns of young adults.

At a time when nearly 34 percent of the American population is overweight and physicians are struggling to address the problem, this information has the potential to impact patients' health habits by presenting the effects of being overweight in a way that patients can easily understand.

"Most people know that being overweight isn't good for them," says Kevin R. Fontaine, Ph.D., the lead author on the study and a faculty member of The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine Division of Rheumatology. "But, until now, it was difficult to illustrate to patients just how much being overweight impacts their lives."

Using data from the Third National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES III), the NHANES I and II epidemilogic follow-up study, the NHANES II Mortality Study and the 1999 U.S. Life Tables, researchers calculated the difference between the numbers of years of life expected if an individual were obese versus not obese at a given age. Results were presented by sex and race.

The results were profound. A 20-year-old white male with a body mass index (BMI) of 45 or more is estimated to lose 13 years of life due to obesity. A 20-year-old white woman with a BMI of 45 or more is estimated to lose eight years. In addition, loss of life (two to five years) was estimated to occur even at moderate levels of obesity (BMIs greater than 30).

Results for African-Americans were somewhat different: a consistent reduction in life expectancy occurred with BMIs of 37 to 38 for women and 32 to 33 for men. At younger ages, African-Americans with BMIs of 45 or more had a maximum of 20 years of lost life for males and 5 years for women.

Fontaine and his team hope that their study will give both physicians and patients a useful way to think about the potential effects of obesity on health and longevity.

"The results of our research confirm - in a quantifiable way - that obesity is a major public health problem that will likely surpass smoking as the leading preventable cause of death," explained Fontaine. "For a physician to be able to tell a patient, 'Look, your weight problem could cut your life up to 13 years' well, that's some pretty strong ammunition to get Americans to understand the consequences of being overweight. This research is an important step toward addressing an issue that is fast becoming the leading health problem in the United States."

This research was supported in part by a grant from the National Institutes of Health and a grant from the Arthritis Foundation.