The British public are at their unhealthiest for fifty years, and are doing little to change it, a study by Beneden Health has found.
The National Health Report 2014 is the first of what will we be an annual study, investigating the health and wellbeing habits of the population against the guidelines recommended by the government and medical professionals.
The study of 4000 people found 71% consider themselves either "not very healthy" or "not at all healthy." When asked about the public fifty years ago just 29% thought the public then were unhealthy.
The report revealed the average man has a BMI of 26.2 and the average woman has a BMI of 25.9, the levels for being considered healthy are between 18.5 and 25.
More than half the population is considered obese or overweight on the BMI scale, while 42% have a healthy BMI and 6% are underweight.
The amount of fruit and vegetables being eaten is short of the recommended five a day, and people are drinking a litre less than they should a day for health. The majority in both cases knew they should be consuming more.
A correlation between education and exercise emerged with those with doctorates doing 95 minutes of cardio a week, compared to 63 for those educated to GCSE/O-level.
Dr John Giles, medical director of Beneden Health said, "At a time when modern medicine is making consistent major breakthroughs to give us longer lives and treat illnesses that even 20 years ago were fatal, the UK population appears to be doing everything in its power to make those extra years as unhealthy and miserable as possible.
"We cannot continually rely on the NHS to pick up the pieces of our below average approach to looking after ourselves: this laissez-faire approach is massively overburdening our country's health service."
He added, "While medical advances will undoubtedly continue to help extend our life expectancy, it is naïve to think that the nation will become healthier in the future unless we start taking a more proactive approach to our health."
