Experts warn of obesity “pandemic” in Spain
On November 17, 2021, the Spanish Obesity Society (Seedo) launched a campaign asking for a new national multidisciplinary and transversal plan aimed at addressing Spain’s growing obesity epidemic.
According to recent data, more than 60 percent of Spanish adults are considered overweight, 24% of which have obesity and 40 percent of children between 6 and 9 years old are considered overweight, and this is unlikely to have improved during the pandemic. These figures have led specialists to predict what’s been described as a “tsunami of cases” in the coming decades.
“Obesity is a problem that will accompany us in the coming years if strong measures are not taken now,” warned the president of Seedo, Francisco Tinahones. “Strategies must be proposed to prevent and fight obesity because it is not an aesthetic problem but one of the most important diseases facing our health systems.” Tinahones clarified the need for a global plan to tackle obesity, and that the small specific actions taken so far had been merely “drops in the ocean of obesity,” and not useful.
Tinahones proposes that this new strategy include financing from the health system for obesity medication, a tax policy that penalises unhealthy food products and encourages healthy ones, food labelling that clearly reflects how healthy or unhealthy a product is, regulations that prohibit certain advertisements, urban planning that creates spaces for exercise, and the promotion of physical activity.
