Eli5: if obesity is so unhealthy, why do countries with high obesity rates such as US and UK generally have higher average lifespans than many countries with lower obesity rates?
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TLDR: Easily available medical care
Once a country reaches a point where medical care is widely available for everyone the life expectancy starts going up fast.
For most Western countries this happened in the 1950-60s. The infant mortality rate in particular was as high as 20% before the wide spread availability of medical care.
The key point is that obesity and it’s related medical conditions are all treatable, so long as you have access to medical care Diabetes, heart conditions, sleep issues, joint problems, fatty liver, gall stones, etc etc are all treatable conditions.
The US actually has some of the lowest life expectancy rates in the western world.
Obesity is one factor in this, but it’s mostly the cost of medical care. The US continues to drag behind because of their insistence of maintaining a for-profit healthcare system. People don’t want to see a Doctor even for check ups because they have to pay for it, so the poor in particular have much poorer health and lower life expectancy as a result.
Because wealthy countries tend to be more obese AND have more technology to extend lifespan, plus fewer exposures to potential death for most citizens.
The US and UK have above average healthcare despite the problems in the systems. The typical longterm problems(diabetes II, cardiovascular problems…) with obesity are well researched and can be treated. Even then it is on of the causes for a declining life expectancy in the US.
Life expectancy is heavily influenced by infant mortality. As a simplified example, 100 people living to 98 years old have the same average life expectancy as 98 of them living to 100 and 2 of them dying before their first birthday. Even if we all die a few years younger, it only takes a few saved babies to cancel that out.
Lifespans are a result of a lot of different factors, not just obesity. The main factors are gender, genetics, access to health care, hygiene, diet and nutrition, exercise, lifestyle, and crime rates. Obviously war and other tumult can have a very dramatic impact on lifespan. The US has the 46th highest life expectancy in the world, meaning 45 countries have a higher life expectancy than them. The US also has the 12th highest obesity rate in the world, meaning only 11 countries have a higher obesity rate than them. The US does have a higher life expectancy than many other countries with lower obesity rates mostly because of access to health care. Unfortunately, the US has a very low life expectancy compared to nations with similar development status, largely due to limits on access to healthcare because of cost and their much higher obesity rates.
the richer country is, the better the healthcare…
and the more food there is to make people fat..
so both things (lifespan and obesity) are related to country’s wealth, not to each other
We have the medical advances to keep people alive—aka, heart beating, breathing, brain activity well beyond what people with many diseases were previously capable of.
But measuring “amount of time being technically alive” and “quality of life” are two vastly different things.
Actually, rampant obesity is starting to affect life span in the US. Life expectancy has actually gone down in many parts of the country where obesity rates are the highest.
Diseases like diabetes, Hypertension and obesity don’t have a cure , but they do have treatments that prolong the life a person can live with mild disability. These diseases are more prevalent in the wealthier countries who have successfully tackled the problems of communicable and deadly diseases like malaria , ebola , dengue etc third world countries are suffering from .
So although these diseases have a lower case fatality rate , their prevalence keeps on piling as new cases are recognised each day. That explains the huge number of cases of these Non Communicable Diseases yet longer average lifespans in wealthier first world countries.
Because wealthy countries tend to have much much better health care than poorer ones. If it weren’t for that, the obese would die much earlier.
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