Stop making assumptions about obesity – expert

  • 13/10/2015
(File)
(File)

The World Obesity Federation has just released figures predicting 325,000 New Zealanders will become severely obese by 2025.

Socioeconomic factors have long been blamed as one of the leading causes of childhood obesity, but new research shows that may not be the case at all.

University of Auckland research fellow Nichola Shackleton told the Paul Henry programme one of the key messages from the research is that people should stop making assumptions.

"Policy makers, people in positions of power, if they make these assumptions and they're not actually true, we might end up spending money on things that don't work," she says.

Watch the video for the full interview with Nichola Shackleton.