The ratio of fat tissue (fat droplets in yellow; artificially coloured) to muscle mass is reduced in people with newly identified variants of a gene that affects cellular metabolism. Credit: Steve Gschmeissner/Science Photo Library A massive genomic study has linked mutations in a specific gene to an increased proportion of muscle, decreased levels of belly
Obesity is a “growing global epidemic,” says the WHO. More than one billion people worldwide are obese and childhood obesity has quadrupled since 1990. In 2025, Italy became the first country to pass a national law recognizing obesity as a chronic, progressive and recurring disease. Rather than treating obesity simply as a result of poor
People with the same body mass index can have radically different health statuses. Credit: Hiraman/Getty Nearly one billion people worldwide live with obesity1. Yet the scientific community is divided over what obesity means for health. For decades, obesity was viewed mainly as a health risk, increasing the likelihood of diabetes, cardiovascular disease and premature death2.