At 25.1 per cent of the population, Maltese lead the EU male obesity leagues while Maltese women, at 21.2 per cent, come in third place just behind the English and Germans in terms of the body mass index of people 15 years of age and over.
In terms of merely overweight people, both male and female, Malta is ranked third just after the UK and Germany, and is followed by Greece, Hungary and Portugal.
The trend could be linked to low physical activity rates, possibly partly due to the fact that Maltese enjoy the third-lowest petrol prices in the EU at e0.89 per litre – the same as Cyprus and just one euro cent below Lithuania and five below Latvia.
The figures are derived from the annual Eurostat Yearbook published yesterday with 14 main chapters detailing different statistical areas of interest.
Malta is also the most densely populated EU state, at 1,272 inhabitants per square kilometre, followed by The Netherlands with 483 inhabitants per square kilometre and Belgium, while Finland is the most sparsely populated EU nation.
The Maltese population, currently in the 400,000 region, is expected to reach the 500,000 mark by 2020.
Malta also has the highest total household consumption expenditure, with spending in the area, measured as a proportion of gross domestic product, of 76.3 per cent in 2004 as against the EU25 average of 56.9 per cent.
At just over three people, meanwhile, Malta has the second highest average number of people living per private household, just after Slovakia.
The Maltese also ranked toward the top of the life expectancy tables with males averaging lifespans of 75.9 years and females averaging 81 years, averages that compare well with respective EU25-wide figures of 75 and 81.2 years.
In line with wider EU trends, cancer, as at 2004, was the main cause of death in Malta, claiming 151.8 lives per 100,000 people. Cancer was followed by heart disease (131.9), diabetes mellitus (23.3), accidents (20.7), pneumonia (16.6) and diseases of the nervous system (14).
While Malta’s cancer fatalities fall below the EU average of 187.7, heart disease tops the EU average of 106.1.
Diabetes mellitus fatalities in Malta, however, are nearly double the EU average of 13.9.
Marriages among the Maltese are shown to have declined between 1994 and 2004 – falling from 6.8 per 1,000 people in 1994 to six in 2004. Malta has the third-highest marriage rate in the EU and follows just behind Germany at seven marriages per 1,000 citizens and Cyprus at 7.2 – all of which are well above the EU average of 4.8.
Maltese also generate the seventh-highest amount of municipal waste in the EU with 572 kilograms being disposed of per capita being produced in 2004 as against the EU average of 537 per capita. The trend has also been shown to be on a steep increase, with just 338 kilos per person having been generated in 1995, and a tally of 471 for 2000.
The full 357-page yearbook, which contains a wealth of comparative information can be downloaded, or a hard copy ordered, from: http://ec.
europa.eu/eurostat.