Tests on 150 male and female students who came forward for an “obesity awareness day” organized by the King Abdul Aziz National Guard Hospital in the Eastern Province have shown that the problem in the Kingdom is getting worse, officials have said. The regional head of Health Affairs, Ahmed Al-Oraifij, said that the studies showed 20 percent of the Kingdom's males to be obese compared to 52 percent of females. “The rate is continually going up,” Al-Oraifij said. “There's also another study showing that the situation in children from the Eastern Province is getting worse as well. The study, in which 2,589 children took part, found that 11 percent of those between the ages of one and three years were suffering from obesity,” he added. According to Al-Oraifij, of those aged between four and eight, 21 percent were obese, compared to 14 percent of nine-to-13-year-olds, and 54 percent of 14-to-18-year-olds. “The study showed that obesity was predominantly caused by either hereditary conditions or poor lifestyles, which included a lack of exercise and poor eating habits,” Al
