Greece: childhood obesity is the scourge of youth under 20

For the next year in a row, Greece becomes the world “champion” in childhood obesity. Experts refer to the need for daily physical activity for at least one and a half hours.

“Over the past 20 years, the average eighteen-year-old Greek boys and girls gained 15 and 7 kg, respectivelythat is, 2-4 kg more than their peers in America and 5 kg more than other Europeans,” says Yiannis Kutentakis, professor emeritus at the University of Thessaly and former president of the National Center “Η Άσκηση είναι Φάρμακο-Ελλάς “.

For obese individuals, not only is the quality of life reduced, it is also getting shorter as overweight people are more likely to experience significant health complications compared to people of normal weight. Diabetes, breast and colon cancer, hypertension, hyperlipidemia and especially cardiovascular disease are some of the ailments associated with obesity,” says the expert.

“The World Health Organization notes that lack of physical activity (hypoactivity) accounts for about 65% of cases of obesity in both boys and girls in the country, and only 18-20% of these cases were associated with poor nutrition. Greek explorers propose the development and implementation of intervention programs in schools to promote healthy eating and physical activity among children and their familiesas well as a process to easily and timely identify families at high risk for obesity and comorbidities,” says Yiannis Kutentakis.

It is necessary to increase the average daily intensive physical activity (at school or outside of school) of young people, on average it is 1.5 hours or more. This can be achieved by adding many short intervals of physical activity (walking to school, cycling, sports) to burn 1800 calories per week.

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