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The latest data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention offers some good and bad news about obesity in the United States. On the positive side, the obesity rate in adults has finally stopped climbing in recent years. However, the rate of severe obesity has continued to increase during that same time.
On Tuesday, the CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics released its latest report analyzing data on the state of obesity in the U.S. The data comes from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHAES), a nationally representative poll of Americans’ dieting and lifestyle habits regularly run by the CDC. While obesity isn’t inherently unhealthy, the condition can raise the risk of many health problems, including knee pain, type 2 diabetes, and obstructive sleep apnea.
From 2021 to 2023, according to NHAES data, the age-adjusted prevalence of adult obesity was 40.3%, with no significant difference between men and women. Middle-aged Americans between 40 to 59 were more likely to be obese than adults under 40 or adults over 60, and the obesity rate was lower in people with a bachelor’s degree compared to those with less education.
The overall figures are slightly encouraging compared to years past. From 2017 to 2020, the age-adjusted prevalence of adult obesity was 41.9%. While the recent figures haven’t lowered enough to be considered a statistically significantly decline, it’s the first time since 2011 that the obesity rate hasn’t increased. For added context, the U.S. adult obesity rate in 2001 was 30%.
States in the U.S. have implemented many strategies to try curbing the obesity rate in recent years, such as mandatory calorie counts at chain restaurants or soda taxes. And some research has suggested that at least some of these policies have had a real, but likely modest, effect in changing people’s behavior and calorie consumption for the better. Policies in other countries like Chile, such as widespread changes in how sugary foods can be marketed to children, have seemed to only had a temporary effect on the local obesity rate, however, so it’s not clear whether any of these interventions can provide long-lasting benefits.
Importantly, the last few years has also seen the arrival of newer anti-obesity medications, starting with the approval of Novo Nordisk’s Ozempic and Wegovy (both are made with the same active ingredient, semaglutide, though only Wegovy is explicitly approved to treat obesity). These drugs mimic hormones important to regulating our hunger and have proven to be far more effective at helping people lose weight than diet and exercise alone. It’s possible that these latest CDC numbers could represent the start of a meaningful change in the obesity trend sparked by these drugs.
On the negative side, the rate of severe obesity—having a body mass index over 40—hasn’t stopped rising, with an age-adjusted prevalence of 9.2% between 2021 to 2023. Other recent data collected by the CDC has also suggested that the rate of obesity has continued to climb in at least some parts of the country. And the overall prevalence is still below the U.S. government’s goal to reduce the obesity rate to 36% by 2030.
As valuable as Wegovy and similar drugs have been for the treatment of obesity, the high costs and limited insurance coverage of these medications (a month’s supply of Wegovy can reach over $1,000 per month without coverage) has made it difficult for many eligible patients to access them. Experts have also long argued that more needs to be done to address the root causes of rising obesity in the U.S. and to prevent it from happening in the first place. So for now, it’s still too early to know whether we’re on the right track toward curbing obesity over the long term.
