Obesity is dangerous, Heart and Stroke Foundation warns
|Published
The Heart and Stroke Foundation cautions about the dangers of obesity.Picture by Towfiqu barbhuiya/unsplash
Cape Town – The Heart and Stroke Foundation of South Africa is calling for greater awareness around the dangers of obesity as it prepares to commemorate World Obesity Day in March.
The organisation said that the global statistics relating to obesity are concerning and 1.9 billion people will be living with obesity in the year 2035.
Chief Executive Officer of the Heart and Stroke Foundation of SA, Professor Pamela Naidoo says that people with obesity are constantly shamed and blamed for their disease.
“This is because many people including doctors, policymakers and others do not understand that obesity is a chronic disease.
“They see it as a simple lack of willpower, laziness, or a refusal to eat less and move more,” she says.
Naidoo alluded that like all chronic diseases, the root causes of obesity run much deeper and the complex causes of obesity can be genetic, psychological, sociocultural, economic and environmental.
“We live in an obesogenic environment where it’s so easy to become overweight that it is becoming the norm rather than the exception. What does this obesogenic environment look like? The population at large are constantly bombarded with unhealthy foods,” Naidoo said.
Biological factors leading to obesity are often not well understood by the general public and people have no control over some of the biological factors that promote obesity.
“Poor nutrition when you were a child, even as an unborn baby make you more likely to be overweight later in life,”
“When you grow up facing hunger your body is primed for a lifetime of famine and less equipped to deal with an onslaught of unhealthy food,”
“By not being breastfed, having overweight parents with emotional connections to food, all have a lifelong impact,”
She Further added that understanding the factors in one's environment and the bio-psycho-social drivers of the root causes of obesity will help facilitate positive behaviour change for obesity reduction.
“We encourage people to seek out opportunities to live healthier, increase activity levels and eat better. We will continue to work towards a healthier environment for all South Africans. Knowing that obesity is not entirely your fault’ can be empowering,” Naidoo added.
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