Written by Hope Virgo Founder of #DumpTheScales and Secretariat for the APPG for Eating Disorders.

As I sit here and reflect in the build-up to Eating Disorder Awareness Week 2025, I can’t help but feel a huge level of sadness for those people affected by eating disorders, for wider society and for future generations. A year since the last awareness week and are we really any better off when it comes to ensuring there is evidence-based treatment for everyone? Are we really any better off with funding? With wider support and getting rid of the normalisation of eating disorder culture?

Or are we sitting in a situation where people are still dying every day, where people are being condemned to a life with an eating disorder and where people are being told they are never going to recover?

Sadly, it is the latter.

Just this week I have heard even more stories of people with eating disorders being denied care, 17-year-olds with anorexia being moved on to palliative care pathways because they are not responding to treatment, people with ARFID having absolutely zero access to any services, and millions of others who are asking for help but being denied it because they are either not thin enough or too sick.

Eating disorders are serious mental illnesses which have been neglected for far too long and as a result eating disorders currently face the biggest treatment gap in the United Kingdom. Over the last decade, we have seen a huge rise in people being diagnosed with eating disorders, this rise which continued during the COVID19 pandemic. What was already a struggling system of support for those affected by eating disorders became one that was not able to function.

Eating disorders have almost trebled between 2007 and 2019, and the pandemic saw a further surge in cases. According to NHS Digital’s 2019 Health Survey for England, 16 percent of those aged 16 and up (19 percent of women and 13 percent of men) screened positive for a possible eating disorder in the previous 12 months. In the most recent 2022 NHS Digital Child Mental Health Survey, the rate of a broader measure of possible eating problems was an alarming 12.9 percent in children aged 11 to 16, 60.3 percent in 17- to 19-year-olds, and 62.2 percent in 20- to 23-year-olds. Whilst eating disorders are more common in women, there has been a rapid increase among young and working-aged men, who are grossly underrepresented in research and services.

The 2022/23 NHS digital data report highlighted those 28,000 adult hospital admissions for eating disorder patients mainly to acute hospital beds – of note there are just over 449 Specialist Eating disorder beds – (SEDU) Many of these SEDU’s are mostly staffed by HCP and junior nurses, with insufficient dietetics, psychology or evidence-based interventions across the care pathway. Beyond this, across the UK, people with eating disorders are also being discharged at low BMIs, and in some cases life-threateningly low BMIs.

When we think of eating disorders, we often think of a white teenage emaciated middle-class female, and whilst this cohort is affected by eating disorders, we now know that eating disorders go much further than just this group and current statistics show that Binge Eating Disorder is 5 times more common than anorexia.

It is the neglect in services that so often we shy away from talking about, the fear for so many that if they raise this, they will have treatment withdrawn. That even when individuals do complain, complaints are often swept under the carpet or blamed on the patient.

In the past six months, the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Eating Disorders has met with patients, families, clinicians, and researchers who have shared harrowing, deeply personal accounts of the failure of our mental health services. We heard stories of children as young as four being diagnosed with avoidant/restrictive food intake disorder (ARFID), who were unable to access any specialist support. We heard of families losing loved ones due to systemic neglect and inadequate care, and we heard from dedicated professionals struggling to provide life-saving treatment in an environment that is underfunded, under-resourced, and overwhelmed.

The report highlights the urgent need for action with five key recommendations:

1. Development of a National Strategy for Eating Disorders.
This strategy will encompass adults and young people, with sufficient funding to reform all services. The goal is to provide timely, evidence-based treatment for every individual with an eating disorder. The National Strategy will include:

1. Mandatory eating disorder training for all Front-Line Workers (including GPs, Dentists, Teachers and Nurses)
2. Investment in a public health campaign to clarify messaging around obesity and eating disorders
3. Funding for the implementation and integration of evidence-based treatment practices including collaboration between services.
4. Mandatory health screening for high-risk groups
5. Training for Carers

2. Additional Funding for Eating Disorder Services
This funding should address the demand for both adult and children’s services.

3. Confidential Inquiry into All Eating Disorder Deaths.

4. Increased Research Funding for Eating Disorders
The aim is to enhance treatment outcomes and ultimately discover a cure for eating disorders.

5. Non-Executive Director Oversight for both adult and children Eating Disorder Services.
This oversight and accountability should be implemented in all NHS Trusts and Health Boards in the UK.

Eating disorder awareness week is a brilliant week to shine a spotlight on eating disorders, to highlight a need, but what you see this week in the media, across social media, is a stark reminder of what is going on across the UK every single day of the year. This year, I encourage you to think about how you can take this conversation further, whether that’s contacting your local MP to tell them about the shocking state of treatment, or making a commitment to check in with friends, or avoid diet chat. Think about what you can do to help us end the injustices for those affected by eating disorders.