Unhealthy living is killing NHS with Britain’s fat folk costing £13.7bn a year

FAT folk cost the NHS an extra £13.7billion a year, a study suggests.

An overweight adult’s treatment is £847 a year, compared to £638 for one of a healthy weight, it says.

British researchers tracked 2.4million patients in London over ten years to see how many hospital admissions, GP visits and prescriptions they needed, in relation to their weight.

Spending rose as people “collect obesity-related conditions” such as Type 2 diabetes, cancer and heart disease.

For the most severely obese, costs rocketed by 34 per cent in ten years.

Dr Jonathan Pearson-Stuttard, of Imperial College London, said: “By far the biggest cost to the NHS is hospital admissions.

“We know obesity can cause a range of hospitalisations including heart attacks, stroke, heart failure. It also increases the risk of cancers.”

Around 38 per cent of adults in England are overweight, and a further 26 per cent obese.

The NHS says obesity costs £6.1billion a year, but the total cost of all linked conditions is believed to be much higher.

Dr Pearson-Stuttard said: “Obesity is a big reason behind the rise in long-term sickness and inactivity in the UK workforce.”

Katharine Jenner, of the Obesity Health Alliance, said: “The food industry makes vast profits flooding our food environment with unhealthy food, and then passing the cost to our NHS.”

The study was presented at the European Congress on Obesity in Dublin.