Fast food consumption has risen sharply in Ireland, a new report from the World Health Organisation (WHO) has shown.

According to the report, in recent decades, there have been ‘substantial increases' in the average body mass index (BMI) of people living in wealthy countries.

These changes were accompanied by ‘dramatic transformations in people's dietary patterns, most notably an increase in the consumption of ultra-processed foods'.

Researchers decided to investigate this further, but rather than looking at how many fast food restaurants there were or asking people how much fast food they consumed, they looked at the number of per capita fast food transactions.

The report, which looked at 25 high-income OECD countries including Ireland, found that between 1999 and 2008, the average number of fast food transactions per capita increased from 26 to 32. During this same period, BMI also increased from 25.8 to 26.4.

The researchers concluded that there was a ‘positive association' between fast food consumption and average BMI.

"The highest increases in the average number of annual fast food transactions per capita were observed in Canada (16.6), Australia (14.7) and Ireland (12.3), while the lowest increases occurred in Italy (1.5), Greece (1.9) and the Netherlands (1.8)," the report found.

However, it also noted that countries with ‘market-liberal policies' tend to experience faster increases in fast food consumption and average BMI.

"The mechanisms explaining the influence of economic freedom on fast food and obesity have not been sufficiently studied. One possibility is that indiscriminate market deregulation favours global food chains at the expense of smaller farmers and local food systems," the report stated.

It suggested that government regulations that hinder the spread of fast food consumption ‘might help to mitigate the obesity epidemic'.

"Although all countries included in our sample have experienced increases in fast food consumption and mean BMI over the period studied, nations that have adopted more stringent market regulations have experienced slower increases in both," it said.

It added that more research is needed to confirm ‘whether deregulation is a significant contributor to body weight and to determine what types of government interventions could mitigate the obesity epidemic and curb the spread of transnational fast food companies'.

The report can be seen here