Ministers at the UK are mulling over the looming public health crisis of obesity that is as serious as the climate change. Health officials here are, consequently, busy chalking out plans for a conjunctive action against obesity.
Responding to the startling findings of a new government study, health secretary Alan Johnson said that efforts to promote exercise and healthy eating had to go “further and faster”.
The Foresight research, commissioned in 2005 in order to help ministers gauge the gravity of the problem, warned that if current trends continue, half the population would be obese within 25 years.
Professor Klim McPherson of Oxford University and Tim Marsh of the National Heart Foundation prognosticate that some 86 per cent of men are expected to be overweight within 15 years and 70 per cent of women within 20 years.
Mr Johnson said that the Government could not afford to allow the problem to aggravate and is set to ask the Food Standards Agency to look into the use of unhealthy “trans-fats” in fast foods. Commenting on the the magnitude of the problem, he said that we are facing a potential crisis on the scale of climate change and it is in everybody’s interest to turn things round. Mr Johnson added,
There is no single solution to tackle obesity and it cannot be tackled by government action alone. We will only succeed if the problem is recognised, owned and addressed at every level and every part of society.
Ed Balls, the Children’s Secretary, said schools also should offer a wider range of activities such as yoga and frisbee to encourage children to be healthy.
Image: wordpress
