Maltese children have an obesity crisis.

Tackling obesity must be everyone’s top priority to avoid weighing down an already stretched national health service, according to Mater Dei Hospital’s head of surgery.

“Obesity needs to be urgently tackled... To my mind it is the biggest public health problem facing Europe,” consultant paediatric surgeon Chris Fearne said.

He pins a large portion of the blame on the failure to breastfeed babies for at least six months, mostly due to wrong advice. Although 70 per cent of newborns were breastfed when discharged from hospital, 32 per cent quit weeks after, according to local studies.

Mr Fearne’s comments come in the wake of new research by Andrew Decelis showing that Maltese 10- and 11-year-olds are the second fattest on earth.

Mr Fearne – who has just been appointed acting chairman of the surgery, replacing Godfrey Laferla whose term ended – believes that unless legislation is introduced to make the island a more breastfeeding-friendly place the situation will take longer to improve.

“Maltese society is geared to discourage mothers from breastfeeding so we need to legislate for restaurants and public outlets, among others, to have special rooms, for example,” he said, stressing that his position had nothing to do with the fact that he is a Labour MP.

International studies have shown that the feeding methods parents choose – breast or formula – have a huge impact on the baby’s risk of becoming obese.

Another measure is to instil a culture of exercise in youngsters and make low-calorie food more affordable – while €1 can get you four pastizzi (with about 300 calories each one), fruit and vegetables were pricier.

The impact of lifestyle diseases linked to obesity and people living longer with multiple illnesses, coupled with an increasing need for nurses and trainee doctors are weighing down heavily on the healthcare system.

Maltese society is geared to discourage mothers from breastfeeding

According to a report out in the UK this week three in four adults are likely to suffer illnesses such as heart disease or diabetes by 2030. The government report warns that the NHS will not have enough staff to cope.

Mr Fearne believes that heart disease, which is linked to fatty diets, lack of exercise and smoking, are huge areas of concern that have to be seriously addressed to decrease the demand on the health service.

These are the immediate areas of concern facing Mr Fearne’s department that has 27 consultants covering general surgery, plastic surgery, paediatrics, ENT, urology, and vascular with a waiting list of 6,000 patients. Additional nurses are a crucial cog in addressing waiting lists, but Mr Fearne concedes that this is not just an administrative issue but also a political decision.

In the meantime, Mr Fearne is focusing on more short-term measures to address the growing demand for surgery by maximising manpower, time and space.

The first step he took was to even out the waiting lists between the different surgeons – the more established and popular the surgeon, the higher the waiting list – in collaboration with the patient.

For example, one surgeon had a waiting list of 100 patients for varicose vein procedures, but this had been brought down to just 10 by spreading it out among the other doctors.

Mr Fearne has also encouraged doctors to carry out elective surgery in the evenings – between 4-8pm – when traditionally the cut-off time was 2.30pm. Six consultants from 27 have so far accepted to do this and Mr Fearne is hopeful that new job plans will lead to greater flexibility.

Another area he is working on is quantifying exactly how much each service costs within Mater Dei to help administrators and politicians to make the correct decisions when choosing how to utilise resources.

“Incredibly, up to now we did not know how much individual services provided in the health sector cost the taxpayer... successive administrations have been ‘flying blind’ when it comes to financial management in the health sector.”