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OBESITY'S IMPACT IN MEN AND WOMEN




Obesity isn’t just about weight—it’s a disease with a thousand faces, and it doesn’t treat everyone the same. New research shows men and women with obesity are playing very different games with their health, and the rules aren’t even close to fair.

Presented at the European Congress on Obesity in Istanbul, these findings reveal the hidden mechanisms underlying obesity. For men, the danger seems to settle right in the gut: they’re more likely to pack on risky belly fat and show early signs of liver trouble. Women, meanwhile, grapple with higher inflammation and cholesterol, putting them on a different path toward heart disease and diabetes.

Dr. Zeynep Pekel, the study’s lead author, says these differences aren’t just trivia—they might change how we treat obesity altogether. “Sex differences are a powerful player in the story of obesity,” she says. “Understanding them could be the key to better, more personalized therapies.”

A Global Problem with No Simple Solution

More than 1.5 billion adults around the world are living with metabolic syndrome—a cluster of health problems that includes belly fat, high cholesterol, high blood pressure, and blood sugar issues. It’s a recipe for heart disease and diabetes, and obesity is often at the center of it all. But even as obesity has become a global crisis, we’re only just starting to understand how it plays out differently in men and women.

So what’s actually going on inside the body? To get some answers, researchers from Dokuz Eylul University in Turkey studied nearly 900 women and 250 men who visited their obesity clinic between 2024 and 2025. They measured everything from blood pressure and cholesterol to markers of liver function, kidney health, and inflammation.

What they found was striking. Men had a slightly higher BMI, but their waistlines told a bigger story: on average, men’s waists were 12 centimeters larger than women’s. Men’s blood pressure was higher, too. Most importantly, men had higher levels of liver enzymes and triglycerides—signs that point to a greater risk for liver problems and metabolic complications.

Women, on the other hand, posted higher numbers for total cholesterol and LDL (“bad” cholesterol). Their bodies also showed more signs of inflammation, including higher C-reactive protein and platelet counts. In other words, while men’s risks clustered around the gut and liver, women faced a battle with chronic inflammation and cholesterol.

Why the Divide?

Part of the answer is biology. Hormones—especially estrogen—play a huge role in where our bodies stash fat and how our immune systems respond. Women tend to store more fat under the skin and have a more active immune system, which may explain their higher inflammation. Men are more likely to collect fat deep inside the belly, wrapped around organs—a setup that can wreak havoc on metabolism and liver health.

“These sex differences probably come down to hormones, genetics, and how we store fat,” says Dr. Pekel. “But we still have a lot to learn.”

What’s Next?

As with any study, there are a few caveats. The research focused on a single group of Turkish adults, and the results might not apply to everyone. Plus, because the study was cross-sectional, it can’t prove cause and effect—only show patterns.

Still, this research is a big step toward treating obesity as the complex, personalized disease it really is. The next steps? Bigger, more diverse studies, and a closer look at the biology behind these differences. The hope is that, someday soon, obesity care won’t be one-size-fits-all—but tailored to each person’s unique risks and biology.

For more on the worldwide rise of metabolic syndrome, see the recent review in Nature Communications.

This study was presented as abstract 1854 at the European Congress on Obesity (ECO). The full paper is still in progress, but the researchers are available to answer questions.

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