ABSTRACT
Overweight and obesity are dened by the World Health Organization as having abnormal or excessive body fat accumulation that may impair health, with obesity further classied based on having a body mass index (weight [kg]/height [m]2) of 30 or more [1]. Obesity is associated with many chronic diseases and alterations in physiological function, including cardiovascular disease, hypertension, diabetes mellitus, gallbladder disease, osteoarthritis, and certain types of cancer [2]. Obesity is characterized as a major public health problem in the United States and Europe and is designated as a disease by the American Medical Association, although the designation is still a matter of debate [3]. According to recent estimates (2011-2014), the prevalence of obesity among U.S. adults was 36.5% overall, with higher prevalence reported for Hispanic (42.5%) and non-Hispanic Black (48.1%) adults [4]. Obesity is also an emerging worldwide health concern, with the prevalence of obesity doubling since 1980 to reach 600 million people (13% of the world’s adult population) in 2014 [1].
