"I could notice it," said U.S. Army Staff Sgt. Daniel Murillo, who stands at 5 ft, 5 inches tall and weighed as much as 192 pounds. "The uniform was tighter."

Early pandemic lockdowns, endless hours on his laptop and heightened stress led Murillo, 27, to reach for cookies and chips in the barracks at Fort Bragg in North Carolina. Gyms were closed, organized exercise was out and Murillo's motivation to work out on his own was low. -AP

Increases were seen in the US Navy and the Marines too, according to the Associated Press.

Out of nearly 200,000 Army soldiers analyzed, almost 27% who were healthy before the pandemic became overweight. Nearly 16% of those who were previously overweight became obese. Prior to the pandemic, around 18% of soldiers were obese. By 2021, it was 23%.

"The Army and the other services need to focus on how to bring the forces back to fitness," according to Tracey Perez Koehlmoos, director of the Center for Health Services Research at the Uniformed Services University in Bethesda, Maryland, who led the research.4