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Childhood obesity and cardiovascular disease: the challenge ahead

Nature Clinical Practice Cardiovascular Medicine volume 2, pages 432–433 (2005)Cite this article

During the final decades of the twentieth century there was an alarming increase in the occurrence of obesity, accompanied by upward shifts in population body-fat distributions.1 The increase in obesity has been particularly marked in children and has not been confined to the Western world.1 There is strong evidence that adult obesity is a risk factor for atherosclerotic disease, cardiovascular events, and cardiac dysfunction2—partly a consequence of its strong association with the risk of developing type 2 diabetes.

The unprecedented nature of the current childhood obesity phenomenon, in which a widespread increase in body fat from early life will lead to an increasing burden of obesity of longer duration, makes it difficult to predict the consequences with certainty. Childhood obesity carries a greatly increased risk of adult obesity, which is likely to be accentuated as adult obesity prevalence increases.3 'Tracking' of body mass with increasing strength through childhood and adolescence, to obesity in adult life is probably reinforced by the tracking of related health behaviors, particularly in diet and exercise, from childhood onwards. The long-term consequences of childhood obesity are, therefore, at least partly those of adult obesity;2 the direct consequences of childhood obesity on long-term cardiovascular risk are, however, less certain.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Division of Community Health Sciences, St George's, University of London,

    Peter H Whincup & John E Deanfield

  2. British Heart Foundation Vandervell Professor of Congenital Heart Disease, based at the Institute of Child Health, University College London, London, UK

    Peter H Whincup & John E Deanfield

Authors
  1. Peter H Whincup
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  2. John E Deanfield
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Correspondence to Peter H Whincup.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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Whincup, P., Deanfield, J. Childhood obesity and cardiovascular disease: the challenge ahead. Nat Rev Cardiol 2, 432–433 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1038/ncpcardio0295

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