World Obesity Day Europe is held each year to draw attention to Europe’s growing obesity epidemic. The next World Obesity Day Europe will take place on Wednesday, March 4, 2026.
The campaign, part of the global World Obesity Day, is an initiative of the European Coalition for People Living with Obesity (ECPO). People from all walks of life will participate to create greater awareness and understanding of obesity as a chronic, relapsing disease.
This year, several associated patient organisations, including those for cardiovascular disease (CVD), diabetes, liver disease, and chronic kidney disease (CKD), will also be taking part to draw attention to obesity as a gateway to those diseases as well as at least 13 types of cancer.
It is estimated that 213 million people in the World Health Organization (WHO) European Region are now living with obesity, and a further 255 million are living with overweight. Together, this amounts to more than 66% of the adult population.
Without significant intervention, it is estimated that by 2035, more than 77% of the adult population in the region will be living with overweight or obesity (263 million living with obesity and 246 million living with overweight). Within the umbrella theme, Addressing Obesity Together, participants will organise events ranging from training workshops for patients and healthcare professionals to the launch in several countries of locally translated versions of the best-selling children’s book “Mum, What is Obesity”. The book has already been distributed to several thousand schools.
Other initiatives include free health check-ups, healthy eating advice and open days at hospitals and treatment centres.
“In line with a global World Obesity Day focus on Changing Systems, Healthier Lives, our multidisciplinary group of stakeholders, including patient leaders and advocates across the community of European health professionals, are working to lead policy changes at regional, national and local levels to build the robust support systems for the future,” says ECPO President Diana Castillo.
Among international initiatives taking place on March 4 will be a discussion in the European Parliament in Brussels, Gateway to Better Health: The case for coordinated EU action on obesity. Vicki Mooney and Susie Birney, will be speaking at the event on behalf of ECPO. It is being hosted by MEP Laurent Castillo and organised by the European Association for the Study of Obesity (EASO). Details of the numerous World Obesity Day Europe events will be publicised extensively on social media @ObesityDayEU and #WODEurope. More information is available on the World Obesity Day Europe website: woday.eu.
The ECPO image bank of photographs continues to be expanded and updated in collaboration with more than 30 patient organisations across European countries.
The image bank has been created to help change people’s attitudes to overweight and obesity. It consists of more than 600 professionally taken photographs to support editors in selecting less stigmatising images for online use and in newspapers and magazines.
Download the Press Release PDF
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Note to editors:
For additional statistics on Obesity in Europe and global statistics for some of the many NCDs that obesity can cause or lead to an increased risk, please see the figures attached.
For further information, please contact Tim Edgar ([email protected]) or Vicki Mooney ([email protected]) Tel: +34 687391566.
For further information on World Obesity Day Europe, please see https://woday.eu/; and on ECPO https://eurobesity.org/
The following hashtags are used on social media: #WODEurope, #WorldObesityDay, and #AddressingObesityTogether.