Expert: Too few people exercising outdoors
13/04/2010 Too few people spend their time exercising outdoors which is contributing to increasing obesity levels in the UK, according to one expert.
Tam Fry, trustee of the National Obesity Forum and chairman of the Child Growth Foundation, was commenting on a report by the King's Fund which suggested that there will be a significant increase in the number of people with weight-related illnesses in the future.
Mr Fry disagreed with the report's conclusion that it was too early to establish if government initiatives to curb obesity were effective, stating that "it is clear ... they have not been working".
"Although the King's Fund has said that there has been an improvement in exercise, it is still according to the government's own figures, woefully short of what it should be," he added.
The expert said that the authorities must think of more ways to encourage exercising outdoors.
Research from the University of Oxford, published in the European Journal of Public Health in February, suggested that obesity in Britain has almost trebled in the past 25 years.
Tam Fry, trustee of the National Obesity Forum and chairman of the Child Growth Foundation, was commenting on a report by the King's Fund which suggested that there will be a significant increase in the number of people with weight-related illnesses in the future.
Mr Fry disagreed with the report's conclusion that it was too early to establish if government initiatives to curb obesity were effective, stating that "it is clear ... they have not been working".
"Although the King's Fund has said that there has been an improvement in exercise, it is still according to the government's own figures, woefully short of what it should be," he added.
The expert said that the authorities must think of more ways to encourage exercising outdoors.
Research from the University of Oxford, published in the European Journal of Public Health in February, suggested that obesity in Britain has almost trebled in the past 25 years.
