Prevalence of Overweight and Obesity Among Adults In Kosovo

Purpose: Monitoring overweight and obesity is important for evaluating targeted interventions, preventing or reducing overweight and obesity. The purpose of this research was to confirm the hypothesis H: A if there are or not statistically significant differences between the socio-demographic characteristics of the participants and the weight status of the respondents in Kosovo. Methods: Participants were 200 male-female persons, of which 100 male-female persons were from urban areas, 100 male-female persons were from rural areas, the material was collected during March 2021. Body mass index (BMI) was calculated from self-reported height and weight. Results: The results show that the percentage of underweight was 1.2%, normal weight 30.8%, overweight 46.5%, and obesity included 21.5% of respondents. More males than females were overweight (54.6% vs 37%) of the women surveyed. Category >60 years - older people were significantly more overweight (53.4%) and obese (34.1%) of respondents than middle-aged and younger adults. Retired people make up a larger share of overweight and obesity (82.0%) of respondents, compared to employees, unemployed and students. People from urban areas were significantly more overweight than people in rural areas (49.3 vs 33.3%) and obese (23.3 vs 13.3%). Conclusion: In accordance with the research objective and hypotheses, we also obtained the research results show that the hypothesis H: A is proved which shows that there are statistically significant differences between the socio-demographic characteristics of the participants and the weight status of the respondents in Kosovo.