Progress report on 'Strategy for Europe on nutrition, overweight and obesity'

December has been a busy month for the European Commission, and Despina Spanou, Principal Adviser at the Directorate General for Health and Consumers, talks to EUFIC, about Europe's Nutrition Strategy mid-term progress report, the evaluation of the EU Platform for Action on Diet, Physical Activity and Health, the OECD/EC report "Health at a Glance: Europe 2010", and the Belgian Presidency/EC Conference on Monitoring and Evaluation of EU and Member States' strategies on nutrition, overweight and obesity-related health issues.

The Implementation Progress report for the "Strategy for Europe on nutrition, overweight and obesity-related health issues 2007-2013" has been published, as a mid-point to evaluate the extent to which progress has been made. It complements the 5 year evaluation of the EU Platform for Action on Diet, Physical Activity and Health, which was published in July 2010 (see EUFIC webinar on the EU platform evaluation).

Prevalence of obesity in Europe is probably the most important indicator for the measurement of progress, and the report "Health at a Glance: Europe 2010", jointly published by the European Commission and the OECD, compiles data and statistics from the OECD, Eurostat and WHO. According to this report, over half the EU adult population is now overweight or obese, with the rate of obesity doubling over the past 20 years in most EU Member States. On average, just over 15% of the EU adult population is obese, with 1 in 7 children overweight or obese. This has considerable implications, not only on the health of the individual, but also on health systems and the wider economy.

If you have comments or questions with respect to the commissions' mid-term progress report for the "Strategy for Europe on nutrition, overweight and obesity-related health issues 2007-2013", send them to [email protected] before 31st January 2011.

http://www.eufic.org/page/en/page/MEDIACENTRE/podid/Nutrition-overweight-and-obesity-in-europe/