Weight overtakes tobacco as leading risk factor for burden of disease
Media Release by Lauren Zammit, Cancel Council Victoria, 12 Dec 2024: Food for Health Alliance is urging the Australian Government to prioritise the funding and implementation of
the National Obesity Strategy, as data released by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW) today shows overweight and obesity have overtaken tobacco smoking as the leading risk factor contributing to the disease burden.
In 2024, an estimated 8.3% of the total disease burden was due to overweight and obesity, while a further 4.8% was attributed to dietary risks. For reference, 7.6% was due to tobacco use (excluding vaping).
Jane Martin, Executive Manager of Food for Health Alliance, said this trend is a reflection of the federal government’s limited action to support Australians’ diets.
“This data demonstrates the urgency for government to implement common-sense policy measures to support Australians to have nutritious, healthy diets. These are outlined in the National Obesity Strategy and include protecting children from unhealthy food marketing, more transparent labelling on food products, and incentives such as levies to reduce sugar in drinks.”
According to the AIHW obesity rates in Australia have stagnated, with 32% of adults living with obesity in 2022—up slightly from 31% in 2017–18. At the same time, fruit consumption has declined across all age groups.
“Millions of Australians live with overweight and obesity, putting a significant portion of our community at an increased risk of chronic disease such as heart disease, stroke, cancer and type 2 diabetes,” said Ms Martin.
“A clear roadmap to prevent overweight and obesity has been laid out in the National Obesity Strategy. Now the federal government must ramp up the urgency and roll out this strategy to support Australians to eat healthy and live longer lives.”
As top priorities, Food for Health Alliance is urging the Australian Government to:
- Limit unhealthy food and drink marketing, especially to children
- Improve how all baby and toddler foods are made and marketed
- Introduce a tiered health levy (tax) on manufacturers of sugary drinks, to encourage reformulation
- Mandate the Health Star Rating system on all packaged supermarket foods.
“We welcome recent moves by the Australian Government to improve diets, including a pledge to mandate Health Star Ratings if industry fails to reach a 70% uptake target by 14 November 2025.”
“The Government has also been working toward improving baby and toddler foods, and led a consultation on policy options to limit unhealthy food marketing to children. These are positive steps in the right direction, but more is needed to protect public health,” concluded Ms Martin.
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