Obesity and related illnesses are consuming a growing proportion of healthcare spending across Europe, according to a conference in Brussels. Steven Carrollreports.
Adult obesity and weight problems are responsible for 6 per cent, or well over €3 billion, of annual healthcare spending in the European region, the Activity in the Workplace conference in Brussels was told last week.
Obesity and related illnesses are consistently consuming a growing proportion of healthcare spending across Europe and action must be taken in a bid to curb the growth of the issue, delegates heard.
"Obesity is a big problem but it is also an increasing problem. It is not only a health problem, it is also becoming a serious economic problem," Dr Jan Polder, of the National Institute for Public Health and Environment in the Netherlands, said.
"The total direct and indirect annual costs of obesity to employers in the 15 EU member states in 2002 was more than €32 billion and if the current rise in obesity continues, the cost both medically and economically will rise," Polder said.
He said obese employees were considered to be less productive in the long run and absenteeism associated with obesity was regarded as a major issue.
Polder quoted a British study which found workers in Britain and Northern Ireland missed 18 million work days because of obesity. This is not the only cost to employers as obese workers were also found to be more likely to retire early and die prematurely, with 30,000 people said to have died of obesity or related ailments in 1998. Obesity cost the British exchequer €2.6 billion in the same year.
Polder said the majority of employers see obese staff as being short of discipline and self control and that fit or healthy people are seen as far more preferable employees for high-powered positions.
Obese women were highlighted in particular as having problems when it came to progressing in the workplace.
Polder said Dutch studies suggested that 10 per cent of its population was obese and half of the people were overweight.
He said the number of children with weight problems was increasing rapidly and about 15 per cent of children were overweight and 4 per cent obese.
"The prevalence of obesity has risen greatly in the past eight or 10 years in all countries, especially in the United States," he said.
Prof Willem Van Mechelen, of the Department of Public and Occupational Health at the Free University Medical Centre in Amsterdam, told the conference that if obesity was to be combated, people would have to become more active in both schools and workplaces.
"The work site is the ideal place to put policies on obesity intervention into practice.
"Both employers and employees have a lot to gain from physical activity interventions. Obesity is not just a major health problem, it is also becoming an economical problem," Van Mechelen said.
"Obesity and physical inactivity are cost drivers and the solution is to stop obesity by encouraging people to become more physically active," he stated.
Van Mechelen said only 50 per cent of EU citizens could be considered as being physically active on a regular basis.
Dr Eva Roos of the Finnish Department of Public Health told the conference that programmes promoting physical activity and healthy eating in the workplace did make a difference.
"Activity and healthy eating programmes are effective in the workplace. At the work site healthy choices should be made more accessible. More healthy options should be provided to workers and unhealthy options should be restricted," Roos said.
She also recommended that "food pricing strategies where the healthy food is cheaper and the unhealthy food is more expensive" should be implemented in workplaces.
Roos called for more "clear food labelling and for the distribution of health-related posters and promotional material".
"Participation should be promoted among employees, which can be done by forming advisory boards and implementing health policies in the workplace," she said.
"More scientific research on obesity is needed in Europe and new strategies are needed for high-risk groups such as invisible and mobile workers. Peer education based in social networks would be a good strategy for that," Roos said.
Dr Louise Sullivan from the Nutrition and Health Foundation in Dublin spoke about the problem of inactivity in the workplace in the Republic.
"Busy working lifestyles leave less and less time for people to focus on their health," she said.
"Nutrition and Health Foundation research has shown that people feel unsupported by their workplace when it comes to engaging in physical activity," she said.
"Irish workers need a solution that motivates them to adopt a healthy lifestyle and shows them how to fit physical activity into their working day," Sullivan said.
The Nutrition and Health Foundation recently launched a workplace wellbeing initiative which, she said, had been very well received. The first phase of the initiative, which puts an equal emphasis on the promotion of physical activity and healthy eating, received "an enormous response".
Information packs on fitness and healthy eating were sent out to 250 Irish companies which signed up for it.
"We already have another 280 companies waiting to become involved in the second phase of the initiative and by the end of this phase we would hope to have reached about 37,500 workers," Sullivan said.