If a long, healthy life is something we’re hoping for — it’s time to realize our own shortcomings are costing us.

A new study finds that 80 percent of people in the U.K. are overweight, specifically those who are ages 40 to 60. Not only are they overweight and inactive, they’re also drinking too much alcohol.

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More of us are finding ourselves in this position, as we’re busy worrying about our children and our aging parents, and working to take care of our own health.

“Busy lives and desk jobs make it difficult to live healthily. But just making a few small changes will have significant benefits to people’s health now and in later life,” Sir Muir Gray, an expert in public health at Oxford University, told the Daily Mail.

“I can’t convince them to lose weight by dieting. But that’s where people have to start,” said one bariatric surgeon.

Bariatric surgeon Peter LePort, M.D., said every country in the world right now is dealing with a staggering rise in obesity rates.

LePort, the medical director of MemorialCare Center for Obesity at Orange Coast Memorial Medical Center in Fountain Valley, California, added that even the degree of obesity is increasing. He works with patients who are considered morbidly obese, which means typically they are more than 100 pounds overweight. He’s seeing more and more patients each year.

“I understand the health problems that it will cause for them and it’s hard because I can’t convince them to lose weight by dieting. But that’s where people have to start — learning how to limit the amount they’re taking in every day,” LePort told LifeZette.

A physician since 1975, LePort said obesity wasn’t even a discussion then. “The only thing that was on the radar was more and more fast food places [opening up]. I I really don’t think that’s the cause of this, but people were talking about it.”

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It’s startling to see how fast this has become a major health crisis for the U.S. and the world.

“We’re going to see more and more diabetes, which is a terrible disease because it affects all parts of the body,” said LePort. “We’ll see more high blood pressure, which will cause more strokes and heart attacks at earlier ages. And more cancer. People who are overweight tend to have a higher risk of certain types of cancer.”

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His best advice when considering goals for 2017: Try to understand why you’re eating so much; look at the types of foods you’re eating; and ask yourself some tough questions. Are you eating because you’re bored? Are you not really doing what you want in life and eating is a way around that? Do you just not want to exercise?

“Find what your purpose is in life. Ask yourself — what do you really want? Then pursue that to the best ability you can,” said LePort. “Most people who are doing that tend not to use substitutes like eating or other negatives when it comes to a healthy lifestyle because they’re happy with themselves.”