THE FIT FACTOR
IWOULD love to write about more positive obesity stats for the UK, but for more than a decade I have had no positive results to report and they are getting worse.
NHS figures for England show 63% of adults in England in 2018 were overweight or obese. In 2019/20, there were just over one million hospital admissions in England where obesity was a factor, this stat is up by a massive 17% from the previous year.
The UK is ranked fourth in Europe for having the most obese and overweight adults, with obesity affecting 59% of people around the continent.
The world health organisation estimates 1.2 million deaths are caused through being overweight or obese and it is at epidemic proportions in Europe.
Even more worryingly, being overweight or obese is affecting 8% of children under the age of five and a monstrous one in three children of school age.
The age group 10-11 increased from 21% in 2019/20 to more than 25% in 2020/21.
I believe this is around the time children are
The only bad workout is the one that didn’t happen Motivational quote of the day
given money for the first time and allowed to make their own food choices in life.
This is where education on health, wellbeing, food – which I believe should be in the national curriculum from a very early age – could at least have influenced some of these early years choices.
Covid causing a reduction in exercise and an increase in fast foods and sugar has certainly not helped.
For some countries it is predicted that obesity will soon overtake smoking as the main risk factor for preventable cancer.
People need to start seeing obesity as a disease which can ultimately lead to death. It’s the bigger picture, ie. the health implications going forward that need to be understood.
I am seeing all these issues right across our training platforms. Overweight children are being brought in by parents seeking specialist help, more and more people are contacting us who have diabetes and other lifestyle diseases, yet when their diets are discussed they genuinely have no idea where they are going wrong.
In many cases bad habits have been instilled at a young age and never changed or understood, by the time they call us the damage is done and sometimes the damage is irreversible.
I could go on and on, but the fact of the matter is, do not wait until your unhealthy lifestyle catches up with you, make changes now and do all you can to protect your longevity.