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Qld no longer Australia's fattest state

A major report on the health of Queenslanders has revealed the Sunshine State no longer holds the unenviable title of Australia's fattest state.

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Source: AAP


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Queensland is no longer the fattest state in Australia.

The Health of Queenslanders 2016 report has revealed the Sunshine State's obesity rates are finally plateauing after holding the unenviable title for years.

Queenslanders have instead passed on the label to Tasmania.

Queensland's chief health officer Jeannette Young said multiple data points indicated the numbers were stabilising.

"We can say with absolute conviction that the obesity rate has plateaued," she said on Wednesday.

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"If something doesn't plateau, you can't turn it around."

Dr Young credited various campaigns encouraging people to be more active for the improvement.

Surprisingly, Queenslanders in socio-economically disadvantaged areas were becoming more active than others.

"They've doubled the number of minutes' walking they're doing a week over the last 10 years," Dr Young said.

About 30 per cent of Queensland adults were obese, while 65 per cent were overweight or obese.

"That is far too many to bode well for the future of the state," Dr Young said.

Australian Bureau of Statistics data showed that in Tasmania 32 per cent of adults are obese and 67 per cent are considered overweight or obese.

The report, which is released every two years, also revealed an "unsustainable" increase in hospital admissions by 70,000 per year.

One third of that number could be attributed to an increase in admissions, totally independent of population growth or ageing, Dr Young said.

"It's purely that we are choosing, as a health system, to admit more people," she said.

"At this point in time, I believe that's unsustainable."

Dr Young said building new hospitals had shielded the system from increases in waiting times, but warned the state couldn't simply keep adding more beds to solve the problem.

The report also showed a narrowing gap between non-indigenous and indigenous health outcomes, but pregnant indigenous women were over-represented in smoking rates.


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