February 6, 2003. Copyright, 2003, Graphic News. All rights reserved

Obesity now a leading contributor to ill-health worldwide
By Joanna Griffin

LONDON, February 6, Graphic News:  Is the world getting fatter? Well, largely yes. While prosperous countries with market economies that permit unchecked marketing of ÒunhealthyÓ food are piling on the weight fastest, elsewhere hundreds of millions of people still routinely go without enough to eat. 

In the 21st century the politics of food are laden with irony, according to a report in Science by Professor Marion Nestle of the Department of Nutrition and Food Studies at New York University. As obesity edges out malnutrition as a leading contributor to ill-health worldwide, it can be of little comfort to nations where food is scarce that they do not have to divert resources into a health system strained to bursting by preventable diseases.

In the obesity stakes, the United States is top of the pile. More than a third of all adults are obese and the number is rising. President Bush has told Americans to stop eating and start jogging. In Europe, too, millions of adults and children are consuming more in food energy than they can ever expend in modern, sedentary lifestyles. By 2008 three out of four Britons will probably be overweight. In China obesity rates have more than doubled since 1989. All statistics that add up to more cancer, cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes.

A recent attempt by overweight teenagers to sue McDonaldÕs for misleading them about the nutritional benefits of French fries and burgers was dismissed because the court decided the plaintiffs ought to have known better, but similar litigation is sure to follow. And while it is true that the food industry does not force its nutritionally poor products down peopleÕs throats, the relationship between overeating and politics cannot be overlooked, says Professor Nestle.

ÒIt is difficult to think of any major industry that might benefit if people ate less food,Ó Prof Nestle says in Science. ÒCertainly not the agriculture, food product, grocery, restaurant, diet or drug industries. All flourish when people eat more and all employ armies of lobbyists to discourage governments from doing anything to inhibit overeating.Ó 

Obesity is thriving in a culture of waste nurtured by politics: the U.S. food industry contributes hefty sums to political campaigns, and produces much more food than Americans need. In Europe farm subsidies mean that Greece, Italy and Spain produce millions of tons of healthy, nutritionally rich fruit and vegetables, and then destroy them to keep up price levels.

No wonder then that government agencies fight shy of tackling obesity. ÒIf campaigns to promote more healthful eating are not in the best interest of industry, and government agencies are caught in conflicts of interest, how can any society address its obesity epidemic?Ó, asks Professor Nestle. 

Her wish list includes recommendations backed by the International Obesity Taskforce: taxes on junk foods and soft drinks, calorie labels on fast foods, stricter marketing controls, and new policies on farm subsidies. Without such measures, health officials warn, we face a future in which our health is so compromised that millions of teenage children will suffer type 2 diabetes and suffer blindness by the time they reach their thirties.
/ENDS