Sign in. It’s quick, free and it’s up to you.
An account is an optional way to support the work we do. Find out more.
THE WORLD HEALTH Organization (WHO) today said that “epidemic” overweight and obesity rates are linked to over 1.2 million deaths annually across Europe, calling for swift policy changes to reverse the dangerous trend.
Obesity rates in the region have ballooned by 138% in the past five decades, the WHO said in a new report, and are linked to a series of cancers and cardiovascular diseases.
Nearly a quarter of adults are now obese in Europe, higher than in any other region except the Americas, the WHO said.
The Covid-19 pandemic is linked to growing waistlines, especially as lockdowns promoted “an unhealthy diet or sedentary lifestyle”, the report found.
“Overweight and obesity rates have reached epidemic proportions across the region and are still escalating,” the health body’s European office said.
“Raised body mass index is a major risk factor for non-communicable diseases, including cancers and cardiovascular diseases,” WHO regional director Hans Kluge was quoted as saying in the report.
Obesity causes at least 13 different types of cancer and is likely responsible for at least 200,000 new cases of cancer per year, it said.
“This figure set to rise further in the coming years,” the organisation said in the new report.
Excess weight and obesity are estimated to cause more than 1.2 million deaths per year, accounting for more than 13 percent of deaths in the region, it added.
Pandemic pounds
The latest comprehensive data available, from 2016, shows that 59% of adults and nearly one in three children — 29% of boys and 27% of girls — are overweight in Europe.
In 1975, 40% of European adults were overweight.
The prevalence of obesity among adults has risen by 138% since then, with a 21% increase between 2006 and 2016.
The report also revealed further health risks associated with excess weight.
“People living with obesity were more likely to experience severe outcomes of the Covid-19 disease spectrum, including intensive care unit admissions and death,” Kluge said.
The authors also noted that the causes of obesity “are much more complex than the mere combination of unhealthy diet and physical inactivity”.
Environmental factors unique to “modern Europe’s highly digitalised societies are also drivers of obesity”, it said, including the marketing of unhealthy foods and online gaming — especially among children.
The WHO called for policy changes to prevent obesity and promote healthy lifestyles, such as taxing sugary drinks and subsidising healthy foods while limiting the marketing of unhealthy foods to children.
“Policy interventions that target environmental and commercial determinants of poor diet at the entire population level are likely to be most effective at reversing the obesity epidemic,” it stated.
The WHO’s European region comprises 53 countries, including several in central Asia.
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
Bad batch of illegal narcotics is being made out like a bad batch of pasteurised milk or baby food. These are drugs that have been mixed with anything and everything .
Step up the war against drugs, don’t appease them.
@Edward Vanderlee:
How is the war going ?
50+ years now.
@Edward Vanderlee: The war on drugs has been a complete and abject failure and the world has thankfully started to move on to different approaches. It’s not about rewarding or appeasing users and sellers, it’s about reducing harms to society as a whole. You may not particularly like or approve of the introduction of supervised injection centres, but I for one applaud them as a lesser evil than shooting up in alleyways and laneways in broad daylight. Get with the times, boomer.
@Kevin Collins: it’s also about Not punishing people who end up mostly through no fault of there own in addiction and or with mental health problems. We wouldn’t jail someone who had cancer but the jails are full of addicts. #childhoodtrauma
@T Paul Kelly: its not going well but it’s 100% the right thing to do.
I live a short walk from Thomas Street in Dublin. The amount of addicts in that area is terrible, publicly injecting.
No society should normalise that.
Support the addicts and jail the dealers.
@Edward Vanderlee: It’s not going well but it’s the right thing to do ? Think about that statement. The answer is counterintuitive but unfortunately we all have to wait for the less agile thinkers like yourself, to catch up with the rest of us. Then we can finally start changing policy, making a difference and saving lives.
@Declan Doherty: no need to resort to insults now Declan. I’m perfectly agile mentally.
I saw three people injecting eachother in the entrance of a hotel the other day on my way to work.
Those poor people. The poor gardai trying to police it too where the courts are a revolving door.
Nothing ageist about it… that’s not acceptable in any society.
I’m in the hostels and there was three deaths in my hostel alone while that batch was going around and I know of good few who died. Why has there been no reporting on that?
Would the author of this piece care to find out how many died during that bad batch?
Or are we too woke to print that kind of thing?
@Denis Rathsallagh Brady: how is that ‘woke’ in any way? Didn’t they have an article a week or two ago detailing a number of deaths to that point if i recall, do you not believe them or something?
@Setanta O’Toole: I obviously didnt read that article but it would be helpful if the figures were put into this article too.
Ive even given them the number for Merchants Quay Ireland.
You sure it was deaths due to this bad batch and not lives saved by Naloxone?
I mean, one knows the risks. Choices
Have to say well done to the department of health who see the value of harm reduction ( eg festival pill testing) – pity the Department of Justice seem to be trapped in the dark ages.
Here ill help you out.
Heres Merchants Quay phone number wont take you a minute to ring them.
(01) 524 0160
The police forces knows who are the dealers, yet no one is getting locked up
@Dominic Leleu: locking up those who do drive is counterproductive. We have overflowing prisons at the present time and you want to add more??? rehabilitation, awareness campaigns though workforces, schools, PLC colleges, 3rd level etc is the way to go.
@Dominic Leleu: forget the typo lol meant drugs not drive lol
@alan scott: those are mere bandages… As long as we have a drugs policy from the 1980s the only outcomes will be rich mob bosses and endless, needless death and crime.
Need to give it to lecturers and staff at all the third level colleges.
Hilarious that anyone thinks our rightwing government cares about saving lives.
80th worst healthcare system in the world.
75k homeless
Drugs policy from the 1980s, which is enriching gangs and killing the sick.
Suicide epidemic
Etc.
We – as a people – are far more likely to throw babies in a septic tank than help the poor and sick.
@Chris O’Brien: Multiple-choice question.
Are you:
a. deranged?
b. delirious?
c. profoundly delusional?
d. lying?
have your say