The food industry is being urged by ministers to put thousands of pounds into a blind trust to fund a national body aimed at curbing the obesity time bomb.
Plans for an obesity institute are likely to be included in the government's White Paper on public health this autumn as a way of dealing with the problems created by a nation that overeats and takes too little exercise. The trust will be created so that industry funds can be funnelled to the institute, which could then provide health advice, commission research and promote changes in policy.
It is likely to be accepted by food manufacturers and retailers as a way of demonstrating that they are concerned about the number of overweight people in Britain and accept some responsibility for tackling the problem. As many as one in five adults in the UK is now affected by obesity and the rates have tripled among children in the last 20 years. Up to one in 10 six-year-olds is now classified as seriously overweight.
Leading obesity expert Dr Ian Campbell will put forward the proposal at a conference in London this week, promising practical solutions which would be acceptable to both retailers, ministers and the public. 'We are running out of time,' Campbell, a GP and president of the National Obesity Forum, said yesterday. 'Every year that we delay is another 30,000 premature deaths related to obesity, and an increasing burden on both the affected individuals and the NHS. There has never been a better time for everyone to come together and tackle decisively the problem head on.'
An obesity institute would be a charitable, independent body that would provide credible advice from reliable expert sources on the causes of obesity, and also on how people can be helped to lose weight and become more fit.
Dr Susan Jebb, chair of the Association for the Study of Obesity, said inaction was no longer an option. 'The UK has a wealth of scientific expertise in obesity and yet the proportion of people who are obese has trebled in the past 20 years.' Others would want to see far more being done to encourage families to take more exercise. Felicity Porritt, head of the organisation Move4Health, said: 'Every year, obesity costs our society £3.6 billion, and physical inactiv ity some £8bn. While the government shouldn't be telling people what to do, it should take the lead. Everyone has the right to weight management and exercise advice, just as they currently have for help to stop smoking.'
As the issue has become far more high profile in the last year various initiatives have been brought in to try to cut the rates, but so far there is little hard evidence to show what has worked and what has failed.
Many schools have begun to adopt measures to encourage walking to school, and ministers have said they intend to promote far more sports in education over the next five years.
· A sign of how badly the film Supersize Me has affected McDonald's came in the lack of any big celebration last week to mark the 30th anniversary of the American burger giant's presence in the UK, writes Mark Gould.
While the firm's big anniversaries are met with parties and spectacular new buildings in the US, the 30th anniversary of the first outlet in Britain saw only a small street party in Woolwich, south-east London.
The hit film, which showed its maker Morgan Spurlock's cholesterol levels soaring as he ate only McDonald's for a month, has been one of many setbacks that have tarnished the company's image.
On 9 October 1974 the Radio 1 DJ Ed 'Stewpot' Stewart opened the first McDonald's in Powis Street, Woolwich. Yesterday the celebrations extended only to a Seventies dress parade involving its present employees. There was no sign of any parties in any of the chain's other 1,239 restaurants across the UK.
