NFHS-5 Data Shows India Forgot Its Obesity Burden while Fighting Undernutrition

A few decades ago, obesity was not considered a public health issue. Even as late as the 1990s, obesity was only seen as a western concern, whereas undernutrition was more of a problem for developing nations like India. However, obesity is now afflicting more than 44 per cent of the world’s population. According to the data from the fifth round of the National Family Health Survey (NFHS), India is not far behind. Most government regimes have focused their efforts in recent years on combating malnutrition, with many schemes launched across the country. While the focus was important for that time, new data on obesity suggests that we may have forgotten the obesity burden.