World Obesity Day Is Changing

On the 11th of October every year is World Obesity Day. A day that was created to raise awareness about obesity-related issues such as weight stigma (2018), investing in obesity treatment (2017) and childhood obesity (2016).

But World Obesity Day 2019 has a new objective; to give way and promote the launch of a new World Obesity Day on the 4th of March 2020, in response to the need for a global and unified voice to answer critical challenges that lay ahead. 

So the focus on October 11th this year will be the first step in launching the transition into 2020, creating awareness around the new date and how World Obesity Day 2020 will help translate recommendations into policy and actions at global, regional and national levels. 

World Obesity Day 2020

You can check out the World Obesity Day website to find out more about the motivations behind the initiative. 

Who runs World Obesity Day? 

A coalition of organisations spanning the globe. Organisations have aligned existing obesity days & activities to tackle the obesity epidemic together to inspire global change in policymaking, attitudes and action. From the Obesity Action Coalition, European Association for the Study of Obesity, Obesity Canada, Asia Oceania Society for the Study of Obesity and organisations in Africa, Latin America, South Asia and the Caribbean. 

World Obesity Day: Ambition

Obesity is now a global crisis affecting more than two billion people but is unfortunately poorly understood. The complexity of the disease, the challenge of developing sustainable solutions and the burden of stigmas means that teamwork is needed to address the challenge. 

Organisations from around the world will acknowledge World Obesity Day on the 4th of March to call for a global response to this critical challenge, so that the narrative around obesity can be changed.

Recent years have seen many successful obesity days/weeks, reaching over one billion people, but by working together on one unified day the reach of promotions and activities can be greatly multiplied. 

So what can we do? 

Spread the word and save the date! As always helping to spread the word is one of the biggest things you can do to help support World Obesity Day. Let everybody know the new date and the importance of creating awareness around obesity.