Obesity in late adolescence and incident type 1 diabetes in young adulthood – published online 05/06/2022

Inbar Zucker, Yair Zloof, Aya Bardugo, Avishai M. Tsur, Miri Lutski, Yaron Cohen, Tali Cukierman-Yaffe, Noga Minsky, Estela Derazne, Dorit Tzur, Cheli Melzer Cohen, Orit Pinhas-Hamiel, Gabriel Chodick, Itamar Raz, Arnon Afek, Hertzel C. Gerstein, Amir Tirosh, Gilad Twig

Excessive weight at birth or in early childhood is linked to an increased risk for type 1 diabetes later in childhood. However, among adolescents who are overweight or with obesity, the future risk for incident type 1 diabetes is less clear. In this issue, Zucker et al (https://doi.org/10.1007/s00125-022-05722-5) report that higher adolescent BMI was related in a severity-dependent manner to an increased risk for type 1 diabetes in young adulthood in a nationwide cohort of 1.4 million Israeli adolescents. The authors suggest that adolescent obesity may double the risk for incident type 1 diabetes even in the absence of other comorbidities, possibly through various cellular pathophysiological processes. The authors conclude that excessive adolescent weight is a potentially modifiable risk factor for incident type 1 diabetes.

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