Officials in North Korea seek medicine for Kim Jong Un's health problems related to obesity, Seoul says

North Korean officials are seeking medicines from abroad to treat the obesity-related health problems of leader Kim Jong Un, South Korea’s spy agency said.

SEOUL, South Korea — Kim Jong Un is more obese than ever, and his deputies are looking for foreign medicines to treat him for high blood pressure and diabetes, South Korean officials said Tuesday.

“He could have been suffering from medical conditions that are difficult to deal with the currently available medicine,” South Korean lawmakers Lee Seong-Kwuen and Park Sunwon said at a joint briefing, quoting Seoul’s spy agency, the National Intelligence Service, or NIS.

Kim, 40, weighs about 308 pounds, they said, adding that the agency believes it is his heaviest ever. That puts him at a “high risk” of heart disease, they said, adding that he has been showing signs of high blood pressure and diabetes since his early 30s.

“We concluded that his health issues are likely due to stress, smoking and drinking,” the NIS was quoted as saying by Lee, of the ruling People Power party, and Park, of the opposition Democratic party.

If the conditions are left untreated, they added, Kim could be affected by hereditary cardiovascular diseases, as both a grandfather and his father, who ruled the reclusive communist regime before him, died of heart issues. 

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/north-korea-kim-jong-un-obesity-health-rcna164215

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