The global burden of overweight-obesity and its association with economic status, benefiting from STEPs survey of WHO member states: A meta-analysis.

Introduction: The World Health Organization (WHO) 2030 agenda for Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs target 3.4) identifies non-communicable diseases (NCDs) as a key challenge for sustainable development. As one of the major NCD risks, here, we estimated the prevalence of overweight/obesity in adults and assessed country-economic variations using -analysis.

Methods: The latest STEPwise approach to NCD risk factor surveillance (STEPS) report of WHO member states studied on overweight/obesity from 2000 to 2020 were reviewed and related data were assessed further. The prevalence of overweight/obesity was pooled using the random effects model. The subgroup analysis and -regression were performed based on countries' economic status obtained from the World Bank's country development index 2019. Study heterogeneity and publication bias were also observed.

Results: Out of 73 studies with 469,766 participants analyzed, the highest overweight/obesity prevalence was found in American Samoa (93.5 %), while Democratic People's Republic of Korea had the lowest prevalence (4.4 %). The overall weighted pooled prevalence of overweight/obesity regardless of countries economic status was 37.0 % [95 % CI: 33 %-42 %]. There was significant heterogeneity in the prevalence of overweight/obesity (I2 = 99.91 %; p < 0.001). Subgroup analysis revealed a higher prevalence in high-income countries [60 %; 95 % CI: 47 %-72 %]. Meta-regression revealed a significant (p = 0.001) association and a 14 % increase chance of having overweight/obesity with increasing economic status.

Conclusion: The prevalence of overweight/obesity is high worldwide, especially in high-income countries that demands a large-scale awareness campaigns and effective initiatives to control overweight/obesity and the associated risk factors of adults of these countries.