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THE 2007 ‘FORESIGHT’ report’s prediction that half of Britons will be obese by 2050, costing the economy £50 billion a year, increasingly looks like an underestimate, the National Obesity Forum (NOF) has warned in a new report.

The warning is based on data from the Health and Social Care Information Centre that shows a sharp rise in obesity levels among adults and children between 1993 and 2011, together with lack of concerted action from the Government on the issue.

‘The State of the Nation’s Waistline’ report (January 13) regrets that lessons have not been learnt from the Government’s ‘The Health of the Nation’ report in 1992 and makes recommendations for improving and better directing initiatives, policies and resources that could help check the upsurge. “This is first and foremost a call to action,” NOF chairman Professor David Haslam told Pharmacy Magazine. “Let’s do things differently and not make the same mistakes again.” 

Hard-hitting

The NOF report regrets that little has been heard of the Government’s anti-obesity strategy, ‘Healthy Lives, Healthy People: A Call to Action on Obesity in England’, since it was published in 2011. It also criticises its flagship anti-obesity campaign, Change4Life, for providing insufficient advice to those already significantly overweight or obese. “Change4Life does not go far enough,” says Haslam. “It is naïve in that it only depicts thin people switching from unhealthy to healthy snacks but doesn’t show fat people.”

Instead the report states that, “there is a need for hard-hitting public health campaigns, along the lines of anti-smoking campaigns”. Furthermore, the forum argues that healthy living campaigns and resources have focused too strongly on healthy eating at the expense of other important messages such as good hydration. The current Change4Life campaign, Simple Swaps, is encouraging people to exchange sugary drinks for sugar-free alternatives. However Haslam says: “The message about hydration is quite new. Indonesia is the only country we’ve found that includes water on its food pyramid.” 

Weight management services

‘The State of the Nation’s Waistline’ also highlights the lack of weight management services available in primary care and calls for greater education among healthcare professionals on tackling obesity. In particular, it urges healthcare professionals to “make every contact count” by engaging with patients about their weight when they present with other health issues. However, for GPs to have a significant impact on obesity, the NOF stresses the need to change the quality and outcomes framework (QOF) so that it incentivises them to help people lose weight, instead of effectively penalising them for doing so.

While the report focuses on the support that GPs can provide obese patients, Professor Haslam agrees that community pharmacy “can make a big difference through initiatives like healthy living pharmacies”. He added: “The Government is calling on healthcare professionals to make every contact count and this should include every interaction a pharmacist has with patients, whether they are coming in for a repeat prescription or presenting with a problem related or unrelated to obesity.”

In response, community pharmacist and NOF trustee, Graham Phillips, called for a nationally commiss- ioned, outcomes driven, pharmacy-based weight management service. “There is nowhere in the country that doesn’t need a weight management service,” he told Pharmacy Magazine. “Pharmacy has a proven role in public health in areas like smoking and EHC and it makes sense that it could do the same for obesity.”