• First ever estimate of costs of overweight and obesity to Ireland

• Over a third of costs are direct healthcare costs - posing a significant threat to health and a major challenge for health services

Findings from a new Safefood funded research project into the cost of overweight and obesity on the island of Ireland has estimated the annual cost to the economy to be €1.64billion euros (€1.13billion Republic Of Ireland; €510 million Northern Ireland).

The study, conducted by University College Cork and Dublin City University found that in the Republic of Ireland, 35% of total costs (€398 million) represented direct healthcare costs i.e. hospital in-patient; out-patient; GP and drug costs. However, two thirds (65%) of the economic costs were indirect costs in reduced or lost productivity and absenteeism and amounted to €728 million.

The DCU team involved in this ground-breaking study included Dr Mary Rose Sweeney, Professor Anthony Staines and Dr Treasa McVeigh, all from DCU's School of Nursing and Human Sciences.

Commenting on the launch of the study, Professor Staines said "Obesity and overweight represent a cost to the Irish economy in several ways. We lose work time, both because of work absence due to sickness, and early death. We have direct healthcare costs for looking after sick people including GP visits, hospital care and prescriptions. There are other costs, far harder to measure: for example the costs to families of caring for sick people and the costs of mental health problems as well"

Dr Mary Rose Sweeney added "When we think about the costs of overweight and obesity, there is a tendency to think that obesity incurs the greater costs for the economy than overweight. This is true at an individual level, but because many more people in Ireland are currently overweight than obese, the costs are actually greater in the overweight bracket. From a public health perspective, prevention of obesity has to be the way forward, as research has shown that it is hard to row back to a normal weight from being overweight, but far harder to achieve this from an obese range".