The Greek Diet Losing Popularity

The traditional Greek diet is a Mediterranean diet that is one of the healthiest diets in the world but recently Greek men and women have been shunning their centuries old eating habits and are consuming a more artificial and processed diet that is having serious weight and health consequences for the country. Rates of obesity are up all over Greece as are diseases like diabetes and heart disease. A survey that was done by the Hellenic Medical Association for Obesity saw that children are affected too with Greek boys of 10 years being on average 3 kilos fatter than they had been in 1994 and that girls of the same age were also getting fatter at the same rate.

The survey that was done at the Universities of Thrace and Thessaly assessed the increased weight and put it down to a big increase in the amount of processed foods, fast food and a reduction in the amount of exercise. Now Greece has one of the biggest rates of child obesity in the EU at around 30% as well as one of the biggest rates of obesity for adults too.

The Greek health authorities are taking the problem seriously and are therefore issuing warnings and giving advice about diet and nutrition. The problem is also connected to the fact that today more and more people do less physical activity at work and tend to have desk jobs that mean they move very little.

While the Greeks are not as fat as the Americans the figures show that almost 40% of men in Greece are overweight and 25% of them are obese. The figures for women show that 30% are overweight and almost 20% are obese. In America one third are obese and two thirds are overweight making it the world most obese nation by far.

Many people in Greece say that the obesity problem is caused by a lack of information about new food trends and diets that are being increasingly seen and consumed by the Greek population.