Obesity An Environmental Disaster

1
Obesity An Environmental Disaster
2
National Childrens Nutrition Survey (Ministry of
Health) Summary of Results Nov 2003

• 21 of children overweight
• 10 children obese
• Overall 31 of children too heavy for their
  health
• 27 of 5-6 years olds - overweight or obese
• 31 of 7-11 year old age group overweight or
  obese
• 34 of 11 14 year old age group overweight or
  obese
• 62 of Pacific children overweight (34) or obese
  (26)
• 41 of Maori children overweight (25) or obese
  (16)

3
Adults

• 35 of adults are overweight
• 21 of adults are obese
• Over half of the adult population is too heavy
  for their health
• Over half of all adults had gained 10kg since age
  18

4
Increasing size

• Prevalence of obesity doubled from 1977 2003
  (10 to 21)
• 14 year olds in 2002 were no taller than they
  were in 1985 but weighed (on average) around
  6.3kg more than they did in 1985
• A study published in 2003 found from 1989 2001
  the incidence of obesity in children had tripled
  and the incidence of overweight in children had
  doubled.

5
Costs

• Personal Health Costs
• Hypertension, diabetes, heart disease,
  osteoarthritis, gout, lower back pain, sleep
  apnoea, increased risk of some cancers,
  reproductive disorders, psychological disorders
  especially low self esteem
• Health System costs
• Conservative estimates suggest 303m direct
  health costs per year
• Population Costs
• 80 of diabetes, related to high BMI
• 3100 premature deaths attributable to BMI
• 11,000 deaths associated with poor diet,
  inactivity and high BMI

6
The Perfect Storm
7
Key Environmental Factors

• Passive leisure time activities
• Labour saving devices
• Overabundance of cheap highly processed foods
  fastfood, snacks, softdrinks, bakery goods,
  confectionary
• Intensive marketing of unhealthy foods
• Urban design that discourages walking, cycling,
  active play
• Safety concerns that keep people, especially
  children, inside and inactive eg walking to
  school
• Societal beliefs and norms that prevent us from
  making healthy eating and physical activity
  choices.

8

• BUGGER

9
What is the fix?

• Changing the world!
• At present social, cultural, economic and
  physical conditions promote over consumption of
  food and inactivity
• Lots and lots of small changes that make it
  easier to make healthy choices

10
Who will fix it?

• Central government, local government, families,
  consumers, communities, schools, food industry,
  advertising industry, transport and urban design,
  sport and recreation communities, media, health
  sector

11
Problems

• Powerful vested interests intent on
  maintaining the status quo eg food, advertising,
  pharmaceutical industries, car manufacturers
• Many people do not have the necessary personal
  resources to be able to make healthy lifestyle
  choices. Knowledge is not motivation.
• Not my problem attitudes

12

• Healthy Public Policy to promote healthy
  choices
• Restrictions on advertising/promotion of high
  sugar, high fat foods especially those targeted
  to children to reduce the noise and clamour and
  to allow healthy promotions to be heard.

13
Where does promotion fit?

• We define marketing as anything we can do to
  create consumer demand for our product.
• CocaCola