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Obesity Institute celebrates first year on World Obesity Day
The number of people living with obesity has tripled since 1978, and over 650 million people across the world are living with overweight or obesity. Working with people living with obesity is central to the Obesity Institute. It brings together experts across many different disciplines with people living with obesity to co-develop innovative person-centred solutions to inform policy and practice from an individual to a system level.
The Institute has just published its first annual report which shows the rapid development and success achieved over that first year. To mark this occasion, it has released:
- An animation which represents a new approach to addressing obesity. It will support the World Obesity Day theme of ‘addressing obesity together’.
- A new podcast which is a significant development focused on ensuring the voice of lived experience from the least heard communities is amplified across the Obesity Institute’s activities. and priorities. The podcast focuses on the Institute’s work with South Asian women and the LGBTQ+ community to develop much needed tailored support groups and more inclusive research. This is being funded by a grant from the National Institute for Health and Care Research and is an exciting step in supporting and enabling organisations such as Obesity UK to lead research important to people living with obesity.
Professor Louisa Ells, Co-Director of the Obesity Institute, said: “It has been a fantastic first year for the Obesity Institute. To me what is special about the Obesity Institute is our united passion and drive to make a real and tangible difference to the lives of people living with obesity. People living with obesity are fundamentally at the heart of everything we do, and the Institute provides the inclusive, supportive, compassionate, and collaborative infrastructure required to bring together the numerous skills and expertise needed to make a step change in tackling this chronic, highly complex life changing disease.”
Ken Clare, who is the Lead of the Patient and Public Involvement hub, Obesity Voices, in the Obesity Institute, said: “I’m really proud to be part of the Obesity Institute at Leeds Beckett University. I think in any research, in any activity, it’s important to understand what the person with the lived experience of that condition or disease or illness is going through. You need to put that person at front and centre of any activity.
“The Obesity Institute brings together scientists, researchers and clinicians from across the university, and at every point the person with the lived experience of obesity is central to what’s going on, and I think that’s one of the unique things about the Leeds Beckett approach.”