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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Endocrinol.
Sec. Obesity
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fendo.2025.1516433

Large-scale analysis highlights obesity as a risk factor for chronic, non-communicable inflammatory diseases

Provisionally accepted
Sadegh Mousavi Sadegh Mousavi 1Katja Bieber Katja Bieber 1Henner Zirpel Henner Zirpel 1Artem Vorobyev Artem Vorobyev 1Henning Olbrich Henning Olbrich 1Cristian Papara Cristian Papara 1David A. De Luca David A. De Luca 1Diamant Thaci Diamant Thaci 1Enno Schmidt Enno Schmidt 1Gabriele Riemekasten Gabriele Riemekasten 1Peter Lamprecht Peter Lamprecht 1Matthias Laudes Matthias Laudes 2Khalaf Kridin Khalaf Kridin 1Ralf J Ludwig Ralf J Ludwig 1*
  • 1 Department of Dermatology, University of Lübeck, Lübeck, Germany
  • 2 University of Kiel, Kiel, Schleswig-Holstein, Germany

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Background. Overweight and obesity are a global pandemic, contributing to death and disability-adjusted life-years. Obesity is a major factor in the onset of chronic inflammatory diseases (CIDs). Yet, several knowledge gaps remain: For several CIDs, inconsistent results have been reported, relating to their obesity-imposed risk, data on most rare CIDs remain unavailable, sex-differences and racial disparities remain mostly unaddressed.. A large-scale cohort study compared the risk of developing 46 CIDs in individuals with overweight/obesity (n=3,101,824) to an equal number of non-overweight/obese individuals. Propensity score matching optimized between-group comparability, and sensitivity analyses assessed study robustness.Results. The risk of developing any CID was 28.48% in overweight/obese individuals versus 17.55% in non-overweight/obese controls, with a hazard ratio (95%-confidence interval) of 1.52 (1.509-1.521, p<0.0001). This risk was consistent across all sensitivity, sex-, and racestratified analyses. Overweight and obesity were associated with an increased risk for 24 of 46 CIDs in the primary analysis and all sensitivity analyses. For 12 diseases, increased risks were confirmed to one of the two sensitivity analyses, while for 10 diseases, results were discordant. No increased risk was observed for one disease. In sex-stratified analysis, overweight and obesity posed a more pronounced risk for four CIDs in female individuals. In race-stratified analysis, overweight and obesity were linked to a higher risk for seven CIDs in White individuals and to one CID in "Black or African American" individuals.Overweight and obesity increase the risk for the majority of CIDs in a sex-and race-specific manner.

    Keywords: Obesity -, inflamation, risk, cohort study, Racial Disparities, sex differences

    Received: 30 Oct 2024; Accepted: 09 Jan 2025.

    Copyright: © 2025 Mousavi, Bieber, Zirpel, Vorobyev, Olbrich, Papara, De Luca, Thaci, Schmidt, Riemekasten, Lamprecht, Laudes, Kridin and Ludwig. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Ralf J Ludwig, Department of Dermatology, University of Lübeck, Lübeck, 23562, Germany

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