This week, especially on 15 May, the European Day Against Obesity is celebrated, with the aim of raising awareness among the population about its impact on people’s health.
A report published a year ago by the World Health Organization (WHO) warned that the already high negative impact of obesity on the population has worsened during the Covid years and that the disease has already reached “pandemic” levels in Europe. reaching 60% of the population. One third of adults and children are overweight or obese.
Ana Hollanda, coordinator of the Spanish Society of Endocrinology and Nutrition’s obesity sector, told Días de Andalucía that in the coming years “35% of the population will suffer from obesity” in Spain, which, like the WHO, considers one. “epidemic” since “it has tripled in the last 30 years”.
Determining factors are “little sleep, stress, a sedentary lifestyle and also genetic factors”, although it also points to social factors as affecting “the less favored in terms of economic and educational level”.
To combat overweight, he recommends a diet “following the Mediterranean diet with local products, avoiding processed products, especially those with added sugars.”
And children, in particular, have a lot to do, he pointed out, in addition to food, to the fact that “they no longer play outdoors, they are more sedentary and have less physical activity.”
Along the same lines, Teresa Senaro, vice president of the Spanish Association of Primary Care Pediatrics, points out that “the latest study conducted by the Ministry of Health in 2019 indicates that among children aged 6 to 9 years, 23% are overweight and 17% are overweight”. obesity”. This is extremely worrying because, remember, it is going to cause them “many problems” as adults, chief among them being “diabetes or blood pressure.”
Senaro demanded action from the authorities. “Now that we are in an election phase, there has to be a promise to work in this direction” and it stresses that many families cannot afford better diets or extra-curricular activities for their children to play sports, And that is that many times “obesity is determined more by the zip code you live in than by genetic code.”
Diet, of course, is what all experts point to as a determinant for preventing and treating it, for this reason, Javier Sánchez Perona, professor of nutrition at the University of Pablo de Olavide, has said that he does not understand why it is important in public health. How “There is no dietitian nutritionist to solve this issue.”
