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Brits Find Obesity Deadlier Than Smoking

Obesity epidemic spiraling out of control, report warns

By Mark Huffman
ConsumerAffairs.com

October 17, 2007

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We’ve known for years that cigarette smoking increases chances of an early death, but British scientists warn of an even deadlier threat to health: obesity.

The Foresight Report, compiled by 250 British scientists, finds obesity is more dangerous than smoking and will dramatically shorten the lives of millions of people.

According to the report, cigarette smoking cuts the average lifespan by ten years, while being seriously overweight can trim life expectancy by 13 years. The report says the obesity crises is so bad in the UK that if will take at least 30 years – nearly two generations – to reverse.

In the last thirty years obesity rates have skyrocketed in most Western nations. The Foresight Report predicts that left unabated, the obesity rate will become extreme by the middle of the century.

The report projects an obesity rate of 60 percent for men and 50 percent of women by the year 2050, under present trends. Currently statistics show about 25 percent of British residents are classified as obese.

The report finds no evidence that this trend is about to change anytime soon. It notes that in the UK, the majority of adults are already overweight and that being overweight is viewed as normal.

David King, the British Government’s chief health advisor and the lead author of the report, says the world’s weight problem is not completely due to overindulgence and laziness.

“We live in a consumer society which encourages us to eat,” he said. “We have a sedentary lifestyle. It's an environment which means that if we just behave normally we will become obese.”

In the United States, health experts say the obesity problem is as bad, or worse.

A 2006 Harvard School of Public Health study reviewed the most credible scientific nutrition studies of the last 40 years and found that one-third of all carbohydrate calories in the American diet come from added sweeteners. Of that total, the study claims, beverages account for about half those calories.

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