If we were to place all adult humans on a hypothetical giant scale, they would weigh no less than 287 million tons . Of these, 15 million are due to overweight and 3.5 million to obesity, according to a study just published in the journal BMC Public Health .
The work also estimates that the average body mass of each person is 62 kilograms . Far above this figure is the United States, with an average mass of 80.7 kg. Or what is the same, North America has only 6% of the world population and 34% of the adult mass due to obesity. On the contrary, 61% of the world population lives in Asia, which represents only 13% of the human biomass attributed to obesity. According to the researchers, if the body mass index were the same in all countries as in the United States, the total human biomass would increase by 58 million tons.
Sarah Walpole, co-author of the study, ensures that the results show that to measure the ecological impact of a species, especially humans, in addition to the number of individuals, biomass should be taken into account . Especially since the increase in biomass implies higher energy requirements, since more energy is needed to move heavy bodies. Even at rest, a larger body consumes more energy and, therefore, requires more food. Obesity of the population not only endangers health but "is a threat to environmental sustainability," he concludes.
