Scroll, Study, Snack, repeat: Why Pakistani Gen Z Is Drowning in a Diabesity Crisis

Introduction: When Health Isn't a Choice

Reels. Exams. Fast food. Repeat.

Now in Pakistan, kids carry an invisible health burden. Not only obesity or diabetes. Both! And it's beginning earlier than ever.

It is often spoken about in hushed tones. A cousin who began taking insulin at 18. A friend who fainted in school. A sleepy adolescent girl reports her illness as "weakness." But this isn't just a weakness. It's diabesity: a mix of diabetes and obesity, and it's growing fast among Gen Z in Pakistan. Its prevalence is silently increasing in our homes as we are fixated on food reels, body trends, exercise crazes, and soothing mantras of wellness.

It's thought to be caused by a poor diet or lack of exercise. For most young Pakistanis, it's an everyday battle. No gym, no healthy food, excessive use of screens, exam stress, and no support system, and you have a recipe for a crisis that nobody is talking about.

Where Do You Even Move Anymore?

There was once a day when kids spent their evenings outside. Now that norm is nowhere to be seen. For women, it is more difficult. A leisurely walk might run into stares, running in workout clothes draws comments. Many prefer staying indoors.

Screen time has taken the place of physical activity. A typical day now goes from school to tuition to scrolling in bed. This is the new routine. Even physical education is done as a joke, just a single cricket match as a dusty old excuse for exercise.

This sedentary shift is not merely a cultural change. It is a metabolic disaster in the making.

Processed Food, Perfect Bodies, and a Flood of Digital Pressure

The essentials, like chicken and milk, are often contaminated with hormones and are poorly regulated. Preservatives, salt, and added sugars are even found in common household products like ketchup, mayonnaise, bakery bread, and packaged juice.

Instead of fruit, nuts, or homemade food, school lunchboxes are filled with processed cheese, sugar biscuits, or packaged chips.

Consuming fresh produce can be costly and cooking from scratch takes time, but small, affordable swaps and batch cooking can help make healthy eating more accessible.

Social media adds fuel to the fire. Every swipe brings forth glowing influencers, six-pack abs, and spotless smoothie bowls. Whilst most teenagers eat a reheated sandwich and suffer from mental fatigue after school hours.

This isn't just about looking different. It's about feeling like a failure. Without the resources or assistance to break free from this cycle, young people are stuck in bodies they are told to hate and surrounded by foods they are told to stay away from.

It's not just weight. It's a psychological loop. Binge eating leads to guilt. Guilt leads to starvation, so you feel like you're balancing it. This toxic relationship with your body becomes so familiar that it starts to feel normal.

The result? A double blow to the youth psyche:

• Glorification of unhealthy food
• Idealized, typically unrealistic body figures

Young adults are left confused and despondent. Body dysmorphia, eating disorders, and emotional eating are on the rise, but in secret. No national discussion of it. Only silent scrolling, comparing, and self-comforting.

Hours of Sitting, Years of Damage

Let's not forget the static routines:

• Children spend six to eight hours sitting during school
• Evenings are often occupied with tuition or screen-based study sessions
• University and office environments require extended hours of desk-bound work

Our way of life hinders regular movement. Setting one's health as a priority is frequently dismissed as a luxury or seen as a diversion from other responsibilities.

Mental Health: The Invisible Weight

Gen Z is carrying more than just extra pounds. They're burdened with academic pressure, financial uncertainty, social comparison, climate anxiety, and a continuous digital presence that challenges their self-worth.

There is a source to this spiral that is all too frequently overlooked: stress, anxiety, and emotional burnout. This generation is growing up under unprecedented stress. Competition over grades, financial insecurity, isolation, and perpetual comparison are pushing them toward psychological collapse.

Over 25% of children in Punjab are already obese. Astonishingly, the majority of parents continue to confuse strength and bulkiness, completely overlooking the long-term health implications.

In adults, the picture is not as positive. More than 50% are obese. Approximately 73% carry risk-enhancing belly fat. With more than 33 million diagnosed diabetics in the nation, the undiagnosed diabetics are probably even higher.

You Can't Fight What You Don't Understand

The average teenager and adult don't have a clue about how to read a label. Most don't even realize how much sugar is excessive, or the fact that a packaged lassi contains more sugar than a can of soda. Nobody ever taught them, and nobody is teaching them now.

We are lacking in nutritional literacy. It is not being taught in schools. Rather, adolescents are being overloaded with diet secrets on the internet and doctor-shaming lectures once the damage is done.

Born in a Third-World Reality

Living in a low-income country intensifies the crisis. It is relatively uncommon to find preventive screenings for obesity or diabetes. Many people cannot afford healthcare due to out-of-pocket costs. The majority of people find wellness trends, which typically come from the West, to be unclear and cost-prohibitive.

But these challenges can be addressed with practical, local solutions:

• Integrate nutrition and health literacy into school curriculums from an early age
• Ensure safe public spaces for physical activity, particularly for women and girls
• Regulate food marketing to limit misleading health claims and reduce promotion of ultra-processed foods to children
• Support community-led wellness initiatives where local leaders promote affordable, culturally relevant healthy habits
• Make preventive care a norm by offering free annual screenings in schools, universities, and workplaces

When people advise "Just take care of yourself," it must be followed with the tools, spaces, and affordable options that make that advice realistic for everyone.

Conclusion: This Generation Deserves More Than a Warning Label

This Generation Deserves More than a Warning Label: Diabesity in Gen Z is not only an epidemic, it's the result of decades of structural neglect, misinformation, cultural shifts, and economic pressures.

These children are growing up in a culture that values health in theory but rarely teaches how to achieve it. This is not personal failure, it is a collective one. But collective problems can be solved collectively.

We can help our youth thrive by providing the space, safety, and knowledge they need to survive and grow.

Sources:

• Sharif et al. (2024), Lancet Regional Health – Southeast Asia: 'Metabolic syndrome and obesity among marginalised school-going adolescents in Karachi, Pakistan' (prevalence = 16.7%)
• Tanveer et al. (2024), AIMS Public Health: Nutrition behavior & obesity study across 62 schools in Punjab (19.4% overweight, 10.7% obese)
• MDPI report (2022) on BMI trends in youth across Pakistan