There is a global epidemic threatening the health of people throughout the world. That epidemic is “obesity”. Whereas at one time the problems of obesity were confined to only wealthy industrialized countries, today the incidence of obesity is rising in both developed and developing countries. Obesity-related medical problems are now even affecting the children of those countries. The International Obesity Task Force (IOTF), a collaborative program of the International Association for the Study of Obesity (IASO) and the World Health Organization (WHO) recently estimated that over 1.7 billion people are either overweight (body mass index, BMI > 25 kg/m2) or obese (BMI > 30 kg/m2).

Obesity is associated with many medical co-morbidities including type 2 diabetes, hypertension and cardiovascular disease, respiratory problems and obstructive sleep apnea, arthritis on weight-bearing joints, liver and gallbladder disease, and several types of cancer. In addition there are “quality of life” issues that are of great importance but which cannot be quantified.

These obesity-related health problems have major implications for the individual, and have an enormous impact on the health resources of every country. The costs of obesity are staggering and threaten to overwhelm health services everywhere. The incidence of obesity in the adult population of the US rose from 14.25% in 1978 to over 31% in 2000.