Have you calculated your Body Mass Index (BMI) recently? I just did – there are BMI calculators online; BMI is what determines whether we’re within the medically determined body weight – and I was surprised to be slightly overweight. I was surprised because I am not even visibly chubby, and I put considerable effort into healthy eating and exercising. I am not unique: most adults of middle age or beyond are overweight.
Lucky are those who reach middle age and their metabolism remains rigorous, for they can eat to their heart’s content and they shall remain slim. For the rest of us, the overwhelming majority of the population, if we want to remain on the good side of the BMI index we have to develop a dietary and workout regime. And it’s not for just being slim and looking good, it’s an imperative of health – the wider the girth, the greater the perils to good health. Weight kills.
The statistics are frightening. We are the highest consumers of sugar per capita in the EU and among the most obese nations in the EU. One in four adults in Malta is obese – ‘obesity’ is the highest category in the BMI, giving rise to significant health complications. In a recent report commissioned by the health ministry, the cost of obesity in Malta last year was quantified at €36.4 million.
And while obesity among adults is determined by eating habits and sedentary lifestyle, more worrisome is the rising incidence of obesity among teenagers. This portends badly for the future: it is doubly difficult for young people to slim down in middle age.
So what can each of us do? It’s a question I have grappled with for the past 10 years, ever since I quit smoking and simultaneously went on a diet (I was aware that cessation of smoking often leads to weight gain, so that compelled me to get onto a dietary regime). What I have found out is that dieting is not all dreariness. You can still diet and have fun with food; you just have to be more creative with dietary choices and cooking.
You only have to survey the food stalls in village feasts to realise that we have almost wholeheartedly abandoned our culinary roots in favour of refined carbohydrates, sugars and dairy products
My starting point was to understand that the dietary fixation of the past decades has been skewed towards the elimination of fat. The emphasis on fat as the culprit in cholesterol and heart disease led to a propagation of low-fat diets in which people consumed a greater amount of sugars and carbohydrates as high-energy substitutes.
The result, according to some nutrition experts, has been nothing short of perverse: sugars and refined carbohydrates (found in foodstuffs such as breads, dough, pastas and pizzas) led to greater obesity and higher incidence of heart disease. So ‘good’ fat is now no longer seen by some as dietary deviancy: some fat in a balanced diet, preferably derived from sources like fish, nuts and avocados, provides a satiating, high-energy ingredient that reduces the body’s craving for sugars and refined carbohydrates.
Confused yet? Dietary advice can indeed be arcane when you consider every constituent ingredient in isolation. Instead, think of a holistic diet, such as the ‘Mediterranean diet’, the diet that’s now perceived desirably and feasibly for health and slimming. The Mediterranean diet was even awarded the title of ‘intangible cultural heritage’ by Unesco in 2013. But in Malta, for all the hyperbole in tourism promotion of being at the heart of the Mediterranean, we have abandoned our dietary roots. You only have to survey the food stalls in village feasts to realise that we have almost wholeheartedly abandoned our culinary roots in favour of foods made from refined carbohydrates, sugars and dairy products.
The Mediterranean diet should be natural for us – it’s the diet of our ancestors – it consists of vegetables and fruits (preferably cooked fresh in season), nuts and pulses, grains, olive oil, fish and a limited intake of meat. Of course, it wouldn’t be a curse to throw in the odd plate of pasta or pizza for a get-together, or a slice or two of bread on occasion. But sweets, chocolates, pastries as well as daily meat – these habits are the antithesis to healthy eating. We need to eat less meat, more fish and more vegetables.
Exercise sessions can also be part of the mix. The health recommendation is to exercise for at least 30 minutes five times weekly. The point of exercise is not so much to lose weight – the calorie burn of 30 minutes of moderately strenuous exercise is pitifully small – but to maintain the muscles and heart in good working condition and, more generally, to enhance metabolism throughout the day.
All of this is easy to understand, but how many of us will make the leap without being goaded? It is like smoking. It takes willpower and sometimes a shock to the system to quit.
As for dieting, the Today Public Policy Institute is recommending a tax on sugars. I would go a step further and also suggest a tax on meats. After all, although the government’s primary role in dieting should be to educate, the State has a duty to intervene because obesity is a huge strain on the health system.