Prevalence of Eating Disorders

Anorexia nervosa is the rarest of the eating disorders, affecting fewer than 1
percent of adolescent and young women (that is, women ages thirteen to
twenty-five) and a tiny proportion of young men. Bulimia nervosa, on the
other hand, affects up to 3 percent of teenage and young adult women and
about 0.2 percent of men. Even more of this age group, probably 5 percent,
suffer from binge-eating disorder. In obese patients, fully one-third meet
the criteria for this disorder. Binge eating is the most common eating disorder
in men, although more women actually have this disorder. Eating Disorders,
Not Otherwise Specified, are even more common.