Expert: Obesity epidemic set to get worse

Monday, June 2, 2003 Posted: 12:42 AM EDT (0442 GMT)

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HELSINKI, Finland (Reuters) -- Obesity has spiralled into a worldwide epidemic affecting 250 million adults but a leading nutritional expert believes the worst is still to come.

Overweight adolescents are on course to fuel an even bigger global health problem as they mature into obese adults, he says.

"The younger generation, the generation after us, will be even more obese than we are, which doesn't make the future look very promising," Dr. Mikael Fogelholm said in an interview.

The chairman of the 12th European Congress on Obesity, which ended in Helsinki on Sunday, said the prevalence of obesity among adolescents has increased more rapidly than among the middle-aged population.

"We can't expect that the present generation will die and we will have a lean generation," added Fogelholm, who is also the director of the independent UKK Institute for Health Promotion Research in Finland.

A steady, and in some cases life-long, diet of high-fat fast foods and idle hours in front of the television and computer, has taken its toll on children.

"Most obese adults now had not been obese children," Fogelholm said. "They obtained their extra kilos (pounds) after they were 25 or 30 years old. But now we have more and more people who are already obese at the age of 10, 15 or 20.

"If the trend goes on, the future doesn't look better. It looks worse unless we can find a way to prevent obesity."

Along with expanding waistlines, being overweight or obese increases the risk of type 2 diabetes, heart disease, strokes and certain cancer. In the United States, where over half of the adult population is obese or overweight, obesity costs about $93 billion a year in medical expenses.

Elsewhere obesity rates range from two percent in some developing countries, to 80 percent on remote Pacific Islands and about 20 percent in Western countries.

Fogelholm believes the solution to the problem must begin with changes that encourage people, and particularly youngsters, to get more exercise and to make healthy food choices. But he stressed that must include changes in how city centers are planned, how food is marketed and the sizes of portions in which it is served.

Ministries of transport, environment and education should be involved in health policies, he added.

"It's a complex phenomenon especially from a behavioural viewpoint," he said.

"If you think of smoking -- people either smoke or they don't smoke. But everyone has to eat and what they eat, how much and the amount of exercise they get make weight control a very complex behavior."

About 1,500 doctors, nutritionists, researchers and geneticists are attending the conference which started last week.