• PROBLEM: Mexico’s obesity epidemic is having a huge impact in the country’s economic well-being by costing 5.3% of GDP every year due to lower productivity and health expenditures, according to new estimates by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).
• COMPARISON: Ten times larger than the budget for the country’s Health Ministry, Mexico’s the obesity epidemic cost. The OECD applauded Mexico’s new efforts of taxing sugary drink taxes and mandating front-of-pack labeling of processed foods.
• 2050: “Mexico is the OECD country where overweight, obesity and its related diseases will have the biggest impact on GDP between 2020 and 2050”, said José Ángel Gurría, the organization’s Secretary General, who is in an official visit to Mexico this week.
• ADULTS: The most recent national health and nutrition survey revealed last year that the share of Mexicans adults who are overweight or obese grew from 71.3% in 2012 to a record high 75.2% in 2018, in what experts see as an alarming public health emergency.
