4 days ago
Ireland avoided childhood obesity increase caused by Covid pandemic, but Europe was not so lucky
The World Health Organisation (WHO) confirmed a link between obesity rates in children and the Covid pandemic due to several factors aggravated by the isolation conditions enforced by governments across the continent.
The organisation reported a 36pc increase in the time spent by children watching television or playing online games, while there was a 23pc decrease in time spent outdoors at weekends.
Speaking to the Irish Independent's Real Health podcast, obesity clinician Donal O'Shea revealed that Irish children managed to avoid an increase in obesity that was seen in European countries.
"We did not get the bump in obesity rates in childhood during Covid that were seen in other European countries,' he said.
"We have measured Irish data to say that we remained steady with childhood obesity rates during Covid, which is really good.'
Across all ages, Mr O'Shea says that obesity rates are levelling off, an observation he puts down to government initiatives implemented in recent years.
Among these initiatives have been the Sugar-Sweetened Tax, calorie posting legislation and the publishing of nutrition standards for school meals.
'Potentially, we're seeing the result of that, which is that we're stabilising our obesity levels and reducing them in certain cohorts of the population,' MR O'Shea said.
Ireland is set to take up the temporary rotating EU presidency role next year which will see the Irish government adopting increased power to influence legislation in the bloc, a detail Mr O'Shea hopes can be used for good in the fight against childhood obesity.
"We're president of the European Union and we're really hoping to get some aspect of childhood, in particular obesity, to become a main output from the Irish presidency of the EU. That would be another incredibly positive thing to achieve based on, we'll say, slow progress, but it's progress.'
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Mr O'Shea revealed that certain age groups see higher peak obesity rates recorded than others, but for a variety of reasons.
'Where we have our peak rates, the decade of most weight gain in your life is 25 to 35.
"And that's multifaceted. I think that's perhaps getting a first car, having a kid, possibly experiencing grief for the first time.
"So that's a multifaceted thing.'
He also revealed that women factor less into the recording of obesity rates as they get older.
'Our peak obesity rates are kind of on that 40 to 55 age group and, and women peak at about 25pc. One in four have obesity at that age.
"Then when you start hitting 59, 60, you see women beginning to downtrend in weight. So we, we need to address the decade of peak weight gain.'
Mr O'Shea also touched on the little-known effects of medications such as Ozempic in treating obesity.
"It's probably not talked about quite enough – the muscle loss that comes with the medications.
"So taking the med is one thing, but yeah, it's a big issue.
He spoke about the difficulty of mistaking muscle loss for fat loss when getting on the scales.
"They will be duped into thinking 'oh this is great, I'm down six kilos'. But they might have lost three kilos of muscle and three kilos of fat tissue and that's not a good balance. So you have to maintain strength.'
