Obesity – Americans still growing, but not as fast

New data in the latest Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) from NCHS statisticians show that the increasing rate of obesity may be slowing, although the prevalence of adults who are obese is still high. The numbers from 2007-2008 show that 33.8% of U.S. adults are obese (32.2% for men, 35.5% for women). The growth of the obesity rate in the U.S. over the past 40 years is depicted below.

Obesity by age, United States, 1971-1974 through 2005-2006:

For the data table, visit http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/hus/hus08.pdf and see Trend Table 75.