The World Health Organization said that rates of people suffering from obesity and overweight in Europe have reached “epidemic proportions”, noting that nearly 60 percent of adults and a third of children are in one of these groups.
The European Office of the World Health Organization, in a report released Tuesday, said that the prevalence of obesity among adults is higher across the continent than any other region in the world, with the exception of the Americas.
Alarmingly, there have been persistent increases in the prevalence of overweight and obesity in the WHO European Region and no Member State is on track to reach the target of halting the rise in obesity by 2025.
The World Health Organization has said that being overweight or obese is among the leading causes of death in the region and is responsible for more than one million deaths each year, according to the Associated Press.
Scientists have long warned that being overweight significantly increases the risk of many diseases, including respiratory diseases, diabetes and at least 13 types of cancer, and is the main risk factor for disability.
“During the COVID-19 pandemic, we have seen the true impact of the obesity epidemic,” WHO Director-General for Europe Dr Hans Kluge wrote in the report.
He noted that obese people were “more likely to suffer severe outcomes from the COVID-19 disease spectrum, including admission to the intensive care unit and death.”
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