Editorial

Obesity in Malta is worsening and is it any wonder? A recent survey has shown sugary foods are the preferred breakfast choices for the Maltese. These include biscuits, chocolates and sweets. Such preferences are followed by processed meats and cereal. Incredible but true. Imagine eating sweets for breakfast daily... and watch your waistline expand and diabetes loom closer. If that is not enough, sweets, chocolates or biscuits were also found to be the most popular choices for morning and afternoon snacks! Moreover, the results of Malta’s first Food Consumption Survey also show some individuals even eat pasta and rice for breakfast.

It transpires that pasta is the most popular food at both lunch and dinner time, followed by chicken and beef. The study is accurate, based on a food diary of 1,000 people aged between 19 and 65 years. Pasta is pure carbohydrate, so the body simply breaks it down into its components: sugars! Bread was also found to be very popular, especially at lunch, and, again, bread is made of flour and the body simply breaks it down into its constituent sugars.

The survey also showed that people consume vegetables and fruit scantily, at best. Tea, coffee and hot chocolate were also popular and these inevitably contain calories because sugar and milk are usually added. During lunchtime, drinking habits turn to bottled water, followed by soft drinks – another worrying trend because all soft drinks contain a minimum of five teaspoons of sugar.

It is no wonder that a European health survey showed the other day that Malta had the highest proportion of obesity among men in the EU and the third highest among women. The percentages are horrifying, with 58 per cent of adults falling into obese or overweight categories. The problem is worsened by the fact that obesity also affects children, who were previously spared probably due to their high levels of exercise. Children are now also subject to a sedentary lifestyle spent in front of computer games, DVDs, games consoles etc.

In Malta, over a third of five- and six-year-old children are already overweight or obese and this tends to worsen with age, not improve, as one can imagine. Even if such children manage to lose weight, damage to the body would have already been done and these individuals, like smokers, tend to relapse.

Clearly, prevention in childhood is crucial in the fight against obesity. Last year, The Times said editorially obesity is rampant in this country, at all ages. That is evident in all walks of life and there is no need for statistics to prove it. Obesity seems to be stalking us, chopping off years from our life expectancy and most of us do nothing about it whereas, thankfully, with other chronic diseases we would be anxiously chasing doctors, undergoing all sorts of tests and investigations.

We are collectively failing to realise, deliberately or through ignorance, that overweight and obesity are chronic diseases with high risks of death and additional diseases, such as heart attack, stroke and cancer. The country needs a wake-up call to do more with regard to prevention, particularly in childhood because, to start with, when they grow up, fat individuals will cost a bomb to treat their medical complications.

We need to go for permanent changes to our lifestyles, modifying eating habits and doing more daily exercise. These cannot be temporary measures and it is vital to remember that, as in many other things, prevention is crucial.