The Navy is the US military's fattest service branch, new Pentagon report reveals

U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Spencer Roberts

A Navy sailor does push-ups aboard a US Navy aircraft carrier

• The US Navy is the fattest branch of the US armed forces, with an obesity rate of 22 percent, a new Department of Defense report revealed.
• While the Navy has a problem, it isn't the only service getting fat. Obesity is on the rise across all the services. The Air Force came in at 18.1 percent, the Army at 17.4 (the DoD average), and the Marines at 8.3 percent.
• Rising obesity rates in the military come amid rising rates in civilian society, where roughly 40 percent of all American adults are obese.
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Almost one in five US Navy sailors is obese, making the service the fattest branch of the US armed forces, a new Pentagon report revealed.

The obesity rate for the Navy was 22 percent - higher than the average for the four main service branches - the recently-released 2018 Health of the DoD Force report revealed, explaining that obesity is a "growing health concern among Sailors."

The report stressed that obesity impacts Navy readiness, but this branch of the military isn't the only one that's facing higher obesity rates.

The Army came in at 17.4 pe recent, the Department of Defense average, while the Air Force came in slightly higher at 18.1 percent. The Marines were by far the leanest with an obesity rate of only 8.3 percent.

These calcualtions are based on body mass index (BMI), "calculated utilizing the latest height and weight record in
a given year," according to the report. "BMI measurements less than 12 and greater than 45 were considered erroneous and excluded."

(The study does caution that there are limitations to using BMI: "1. Service members with higher lean body mass may be misclassified as obese based on their BMI. 2. Not all Service members had a height or weight measurement available in the Vitals data each year. 3. BMI measures should be interpreted with caution, as some of them can be based on self-reported height and weight.)

Among the services, obesity rates were higher among males than females. They were also higher among individuals 35 and over as opposed to those in their 20s. "The overall prevalence of obesity has increased steadily since 2014," the Pentagon report said.

Obesity is on the rise across the services, The New York Times notes, explaining that the Navy's obesity rate has increased sixfold since 2011, while the rates for the other services have more than doubled.

This trend appears linked to one prevalent in civilian society, where 30.8 percent of all adult Americans are considered obese, according to information provided by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

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Roughly 30 percent of Americans between the ages of 17 and 24 are ineligible for recruitment, Army Times reported last year, noting that a third of that group are disqualified for their weight. "Out of all the reasons that we have future soldiers disqualify, the largest - 31 percent - is obesity," Maj. Gen. Frank Muth, head of Army Recruiting Command said last October.

"The high prevalence of obesity in the US poses a serious challenge to recruiting and retaining healthy Soldiers," the Army's 2018 Health of the Force report explained.

"Obesity negatively impacts physical performance and military readiness and is associated with long-term health problems such as hypertension, diabetes, coronary heart disease, stroke, cancer, and risk for all-cause mortality," the new DoD report read.