♦ According to the World Obesity Atlas 2026, India now ranks second globally for children who are overweight and living with obesity after China, beating the US and other Western nations. Compiling figures till 2025, researchers estimated that India could have 41 million children with high body mass index (BMI) and 14 million living with obesity. 

♦ In India, altogether 14.9 million children in the five to nine age group and more than 26 million children in the 10-19 age bracket were overweight or obese in 2025. Worldwide, the atlas found that more than one in five (20.7 per cent) in the 5-19 age group are living with obesity or are overweight, an increase of 14.6 per cent since 2010.

♦ Of the eight countries projected to have more than 10 million children with high BMI, China, India and the US each had over 10 million children living with obesity. China leads both categories, with 62 million children with high BMI and 33 million with only obesity, followed by India and the US (27 million high BMI; 13 million obesity).

♦ The Atlas presents a series of childhood obesity prevalence projections for the period 2025 to 2040. Estimates suggest that in this period, 20 million children in India will be living with obesity and 56 million will be either overweight or living with obesity.