Mobilizing governments and society to combat obesity: Reflections on how data from the WHO European Childhood Obesity Surveillance Initiative are helping to drive policy progress

• Autor(a) principal: Breda, João
• Data de Publicação: 2021
• Outros Autores: Farrugia Sant'Angelo, Victoria, Duleva, Vesselka, Galeone, Daniela, Heinen, Mirjam M., Kelleher, Cecily C., Menzano, Maria Teresa, Musić Milanović, Sanja, Mitchell, Lachlan, Pudule, Iveta, Rito, Ana Isabel, Shengelia, Lela, Spinelli, Angela, Spiroski, Igor, Yardim, Nazan, Buoncristiano, Marta, Williams, Julianne, Rakovac, Ivo, McColl, Karen
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: http://hdl.handle.net/10400.18/7947
• topic: Children; Obesity; Policy; Schools; World Health Organization; European Childhood Obesity Surveillance Initiative; COSI; Estilos de Vida e Impacto na Saúde; Políticas de Saúde; Portugal

To meet the need for regular and reliable data on the prevalence of overweight andobesity among children in Europe, the World Health Organization (WHO) EuropeanChildhood Obesity Surveillance Initiative (COSI) was established in 2007. Theresulting robust surveillance system has improved understanding of the public healthchallenge of childhood overweight and obesity in the WHO European Region. For the past decade, data from COSI have helped to inform and drive policy action onnutrition and physical activity in the region. This paper describes illustrative examplesof how COSI data have fed into national and international policy, but the real scopeof COSI's impact is likely to be much broader. In some countries, there are signs thatpolicy responses to COSI data have helped halt the rise in childhood obesity. As thecountries of the WHO European Region commit to pursuing United Action for BetterHealth in Europe in WHO's new European Programme of Work, COSI provides anexcellent example of such united action in practice. Further collaborative action willbe key to tackling this major public health challenge which affects children through-out the region