To what extent is obesity a public health issue
To what extent is obesity a public health issue and in what ways might psychologists contribute to the resolution of problems arising from it?
We are, according to most public health authorities, in the midst of a pandemic of “globesity”, (global obesity) a term coined by the World Health Organisation in 2001. The question remains whether globesity is a disease itself, a symptom of underlying physiological or psychological illnesses or even a sign of social excess and therefore not a disease in the medical sense at all. This ‘obesity epidemic’ seems to be increasing and many countries have started looking into ways of preventing or slowing down this epidemic by introducing initiatives. For example, in October 2007, the UK Government launched its ‘Tackling Obesities’ project and reported that most adults in the UK were already overweight, and predicted that by 2050 around 60% of men and 50% of women would be clinically obese. It has also been suggested that obesity must have an association with long-term health prospects. The connection between obesity and the risk of ill health has been recognised in Western cultures for at least two thousand years and it first became a noticeable health issue in the USA and recognised as a chronic disease in 1985 by the USA’s National Institutes of Health, although many people disagree with this classification. While it is acknowledged as a public health threat, many prefer to see obesity as a risk factor for other diseases rather than a disease in its own right. It is associations between obesity and serious diseases such as diabetes and cardiovascular diseases that have lead obesity to be known as a major killer. Obesity has been defined as having an excess accumulation of body fat (Prentice and Jebb, 2003). It is the excess body fat that creates the most serious health problems.The National Audit Office (1) clearly highlighted the damaging impact obesity has on health: both the impact on the individual - for example, on
We are, according to most public health authorities, in the midst of a pandemic of “globesity”, (global obesity) a term coined by the World Health Organisation in 2001. The question remains whether globesity is a disease itself, a symptom of underlying physiological or psychological illnesses or even a sign of social excess and therefore not a disease in the medical sense at all. This ‘obesity epidemic’ seems to be increasing and many countries have started looking into ways of preventing or slowing down this epidemic by introducing initiatives. For example, in October 2007, the UK Government launched its ‘Tackling Obesities’ project and reported that most adults in the UK were already overweight, and predicted that by 2050 around 60% of men and 50% of women would be clinically obese. It has also been suggested that obesity must have an association with long-term health prospects. The connection between obesity and the risk of ill health has been recognised in Western cultures for at least two thousand years and it first became a noticeable health issue in the USA and recognised as a chronic disease in 1985 by the USA’s National Institutes of Health, although many people disagree with this classification. While it is acknowledged as a public health threat, many prefer to see obesity as a risk factor for other diseases rather than a disease in its own right. It is associations between obesity and serious diseases such as diabetes and cardiovascular diseases that have lead obesity to be known as a major killer. Obesity has been defined as having an excess accumulation of body fat (Prentice and Jebb, 2003). It is the excess body fat that creates the most serious health problems.The National Audit Office (1) clearly highlighted the damaging impact obesity has on health: both the impact on the individual - for example, on