NATIONAL Obesity Week kicked off today and according to health experts there are more fatter women that there are men. KZN Health MEC, Dr Sibongiseni Dhlomo said South Africa faces a bigger danger as current efforts are concentrated on fighting HIV and Tuberculosis neglecting a new encroaching threat in a form of non-communicable diseases.
‘Already in this country some 66% of women and 33% of men are overweight and our healthcare facilities are observing an increase of relatively young people suffering from high blood pressure; coronary heart diseases; diabetes and several types of cancers.’ He says this has to be curbed as it now threatens people at the most productive period of their lives.
What’s more bad lifestyle choices are a burden to the healthcare ‘system. According to the World Health Organization (WHO) at least 2.8 million adults around the globe die each year as a result of being overweight or obese.
‘The time has come for our people to understand that being obese is detrimental to good health’, Dhlomo said as the world observes the National Obesity Week from 15 to 19 October.
He said most of the conditions that lead to illnesses suffered by South Africans were “self-made as they come about through what we eat; drink and the choice we make of not engaging in physical exercise”.
Dhlomo says this country has made so much investment and gains in fighting HIV, AIDS and Tuberculosis and that it can now ill-afford to lose lives through non-communicable diseases, better known as diseases of lifestyle.
