Today’s 40 year-olds are 55 in health years London – Arabstoday A combination of a bad diet and lack of exercise has meant today’s adults are 15 years older than their parents in terms of health, research has found. The study’s author Gerben Hulsegge, from the Dutch National Institute for Public Health and the Environment claims that youngsters are more prone to experience high blood pressure and to suffer from obesity and diabetes earlier in their lives than past generations, and that the age gap in metabolic health could slow the increase in life expectancy.
Gerben explained: “The prevalence of obesity in our youngest generation of men and women at the mean age of 40 is similar to that of our oldest generation at the mean age of 55.”
“This means that this younger generation is 15 years ahead of the older generation and will be exposed to obesity for a longer time,” he added.
The research found that women in their 20s are twice as likely to be obese than previous generations, while men in their 30s are 30 percent more likely to be overweight than those ten years ago.
The study, published in the European Journal of Preventive Cardiology, highlighted blood pressure has also increased in both sexes and men are more likely than their father or grandfather to have diabetes.
Hulsegge, said that as smoking declines, healthcare could shift focus from diseases such as lung cancer to obesity.
He said life expectancy is likely to continue to rise with this shift, but added, “It’s also possible that in the more distant future, as a result of our current trends in obesity, the rate of increase in life expectancy may well slow down.”