Repositioning of the global epicentre of non-optimal cholesterol

High blood cholesterol is typically considered a feature of wealthy western countries1,2. However, dietary and behavioural determinants of blood cholesterol are changing rapidly throughout the world3 and countries are using lipid-lowering medications at varying rates. These changes can have distinct effects on the levels of high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol and non-HDL cholesterol, which have different effects on human health4,5. However, the trends of HDL and non-HDL cholesterol levels over time have not been previously reported in a global analysis. Here we pooled 1,127 population-based studies that measured blood lipids in 102.6 million individuals aged 18 years and older to estimate trends from 1980 to 2018 in mean total, non-HDL and HDL cholesterol levels for 200 countries. Globally, there was little change in total or non-HDL cholesterol from 1980 to 2018. This was a net effect of increases in low- and middle-income countries, especially in east and southeast Asia, and decreases in high-income western countries, especially those in northwestern Europe, and in central and eastern Europe. As a result, countries with the highest level of non-HDL cholesterol—which is a marker of cardiovascular risk—changed from those in western Europe such as Belgium, Finland, Greenland, Iceland, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland and Malta in 1980 to those in Asia and the Pacific, such as Tokelau, Malaysia, The Philippines and Thailand. In 2017, high non-HDL cholesterol was responsible for an estimated 3.9 million (95% credible interval 3.7 million–4.2 million) worldwide deaths, half of which occurred in east, southeast and south Asia. The global repositioning of lipid-related risk, with non-optimal cholesterol shifting from a distinct feature of high-income countries in northwestern Europe, north America and Australasia to one that affects countries in east and southeast Asia and Oceania should motivate the use of population-based policies and personal interventions to improve nutrition and enhance access to treatment throughout the world.</p

A century of trends in adult human height

Being taller is associated with enhanced longevity, and higher education and earnings. We reanalysed 1472 population-based studies, with measurement of height on more than 18.6 million participants to estimate mean height for people born between 1896 and 1996 in 200 countries. The largest gain in adult height over the past century has occurred in South Korean women and Iranian men, who became 20.2 cm (95% credible interval 17.5-22.7) and 16.5 cm (13.3-19.7) taller, respectively. In contrast, there was little change in adult height in some sub-Saharan African countries and in South Asia over the century of analysis. The tallest people over these 100 years are men born in the Netherlands in the last quarter of 20th century, whose average heights surpassed 182.5 cm, and the shortest were women born in Guatemala in 1896 (140.3 cm; 135.8-144.8). The height differential between the tallest and shortest populations was 19-20 cm a century ago, and has remained the same for women and increased for men a century later despite substantial changes in the ranking of countries

Rising rural body-mass index is the main driver of the global obesity epidemic in adults

Body-mass index (BMI) has increased steadily in most countries in parallel with a rise in the proportion of the population who live in cities 1,2 . This has led to a widely reported view that urbanization is one of the most important drivers of the global rise in obesity 3�6 . Here we use 2,009 population-based studies, with measurements of height and weight in more than 112 million adults, to report national, regional and global trends in mean BMI segregated by place of residence (a rural or urban area) from 1985 to 2017. We show that, contrary to the dominant paradigm, more than 55 of the global rise in mean BMI from 1985 to 2017�and more than 80 in some low- and middle-income regions�was due to increases in BMI in rural areas. This large contribution stems from the fact that, with the exception of women in sub-Saharan Africa, BMI is increasing at the same rate or faster in rural areas than in cities in low- and middle-income regions. These trends have in turn resulted in a closing�and in some countries reversal�of the gap in BMI between urban and rural areas in low- and middle-income countries, especially for women. In high-income and industrialized countries, we noted a persistently higher rural BMI, especially for women. There is an urgent need for an integrated approach to rural nutrition that enhances financial and physical access to healthy foods, to avoid replacing the rural undernutrition disadvantage in poor countries with a more general malnutrition disadvantage that entails excessive consumption of low-quality calories. © 2019, The Author(s)

Repositioning of the global epicentre of non-optimal cholesterol

High blood cholesterol is typically considered a feature of wealthy western countries1,2. However, dietary and behavioural determinants of blood cholesterol are changing rapidly throughout the world3 and countries are using lipid-lowering medications at varying rates. These changes can have distinct effects on the levels of high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol and non-HDL cholesterol, which have different effects on human health4,5. However, the trends of HDL and non-HDL cholesterol levels over time have not been previously reported in a global analysis. Here we pooled 1,127 population-based studies that measured blood lipids in 102.6 million individuals aged 18 years and older to estimate trends from 1980 to 2018 in mean total, non-HDL and HDL cholesterol levels for 200 countries. Globally, there was little change in total or non-HDL cholesterol from 1980 to 2018. This was a net effect of increases in low- and middle-income countries, especially in east and southeast Asia, and decreases in high-income western countries, especially those in northwestern Europe, and in central and eastern Europe. As a result, countries with the highest level of non-HDL cholesterol�which is a marker of cardiovascular risk�changed from those in western Europe such as Belgium, Finland, Greenland, Iceland, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland and Malta in 1980 to those in Asia and the Pacific, such as Tokelau, Malaysia, The Philippines and Thailand. In 2017, high non-HDL cholesterol was responsible for an estimated 3.9 million (95 credible interval 3.7 million�4.2 million) worldwide deaths, half of which occurred in east, southeast and south Asia. The global repositioning of lipid-related risk, with non-optimal cholesterol shifting from a distinct feature of high-income countries in northwestern Europe, north America and Australasia to one that affects countries in east and southeast Asia and Oceania should motivate the use of population-based policies and personal interventions to improve nutrition and enhance access to treatment throughout the world. © 2020, The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Limited

Geology of the plutonic basement rocks of Stewart Island, New Zealand

Exposures of basement rocks on Stewart Island provide a c. 70 km long by 50 km wide map of part of the Median Batholith that spans the margin of the Western Province. Because of their distance from the present plate boundary, these rocks are relatively unaffected by Cenozoic tectonism, allowing examination of unmodified Carboniferous–Cretaceous relationships within the Median Batholith. Thirty individual plutons (>c. 20 km2) have been mapped along with numerous relatively small intrusions ( biotite (c. 23%); gabbro and anorthosite (c. 12%) and ultramafic rocks (c. 2%). U-Pb zircon and monazite dating indicates that c. 12% of these plutonic rocks were emplaced during the Carboniferous between 345 and 290 Ma, c. 20% in the Early–Middle Jurassic at c. 170–165 Ma, c. 30% in the latest Jurassic to earliest Cretaceous between 152 and 128 Ma, and c. 38% in the Early Cretaceous between 128 and 100 Ma. The distribution of Pegasus Group schists and peraluminous granitoid rocks indicates that the northern limit of extensive early Paleozoic Western Province basement is located either within the Gutter Shear Zone or at the Escarpment Fault, 10–15 km south of the Freshwater Fault System previously thought to mark this boundary. Carboniferous and Middle Jurassic magmatism extended plutonic basement northwards as far as the Freshwater Fault System, while further magmatism during the latest Jurassic and earliest Cretaceous produced the basement north of the Freshwater Fault System. The focus of Early Cretaceous plutonism then returned southwards into the Western Province, although the older basement in this area was only involved in the genesis of subordinate peraluminous plutonism at this time and not the more extensive metaluminous rocks. The Escarpment Fault disrupted this c. 40 km wide section across the margin of the Western Province at c. 110–100 Ma.

Geology of the plutonic basement rocks of Stewart Island, New Zealand

Exposures of basement rocks on Stewart Island provide a c. 70 km long by 50 km wide map of part of the Median Batholith that spans the margin of the Western Province. Because of their distance from the present plate boundary, these rocks are relatively unaffected by Cenozoic tectonism, allowing examination of unmodified Carboniferous–Cretaceous relationships within the Median Batholith. Thirty individual plutons (>c. 20 km2) have been mapped along with numerous relatively small intrusions ( biotite (c. 23%); gabbro and anorthosite (c. 12%) and ultramafic rocks (c. 2%). U-Pb zircon and monazite dating indicates that c. 12% of these plutonic rocks were emplaced during the Carboniferous between 345 and 290 Ma, c. 20% in the Early–Middle Jurassic at c. 170–165 Ma, c. 30% in the latest Jurassic to earliest Cretaceous between 152 and 128 Ma, and c. 38% in the Early Cretaceous between 128 and 100 Ma. The distribution of Pegasus Group schists and peraluminous granitoid rocks indicates that the northern limit of extensive early Paleozoic Western Province basement is located either within the Gutter Shear Zone or at the Escarpment Fault, 10–15 km south of the Freshwater Fault System previously thought to mark this boundary. Carboniferous and Middle Jurassic magmatism extended plutonic basement northwards as far as the Freshwater Fault System, while further magmatism during the latest Jurassic and earliest Cretaceous produced the basement north of the Freshwater Fault System. The focus of Early Cretaceous plutonism then returned southwards into the Western Province, although the older basement in this area was only involved in the genesis of subordinate peraluminous plutonism at this time and not the more extensive metaluminous rocks. The Escarpment Fault disrupted this c. 40 km wide section across the margin of the Western Province at c. 110–100 Ma.