Healthy lifestyle is best medicine

JAMIE Maxtone-Graham is a health fanatic.
He has reason to be.
The former health minister freely confesses to having 80% of his arteries blocked at one time when he was obese and living dangerously.
One day, he collapsed and was rushed to the hospital where he was diagnosed with the symptoms described above.
The doctor prescribed medevac to Australia for a triple heart by-pass.
Maxtone-Graham did not go for surgery or medication.
He chose to change the food and drinks he was pouring into his body.
He is now half his weight, leaner and looks very many years younger.
He explains: “People spend heaps of money on their cars but when it comes to what they take into their body, they are negligent.
“They spend a lifetime on gathering wealth to the detriment of their health.
“By the time they realise they have health problems and try to spend their wealth on looking after their health, it is way too late.
“It (our junk food eating habits) is a serious threat to our national security, well-being and economy.
“All we have to do is visit our friends in Nauru and look at how diabetes ravaged a whole nation.
“They once upon a time held the title of being the world’s richest people.
“What is the legacy left behind from all their phosphate wealth?
“The diabetes epidemic has literally crippled the whole nation. 
“With a population of 60,000, they have 12 dialysis machine working full-time cleaning the blood of diabetic patients with failed kidneys.
“Papua New Guinea, with a population of seven million people, has only one dialysis machine.
“They (Nauru) have the highest rates of amputation due to diabetes.
“They have high rates of blindness due to diabetes, they have highest rates of stroke due to diabetes, they have highest rates of cancer due to diabetes, and they have the highest rates of heart disease due to diabetes.
“All the wealth from the phosphate has destroyed a nation.
“All the wealth has literary disappeared into thin air. The only residue is a sick population.
“We should learn from them fast.
“I am really worried about our own situation when the wealth from the multi-billion kina liquefied natural gas project start flowing into the hands of our populace. Imagine what is going to happen to us?”
This really is one man’s opinion and we would leave it at that except that much of what he is saying (not about Nauruans but about PNG’s lifestyles) makes a lot of sobering sense.
Too many young people are dropping dead in the most productive periods of their lives.
Much of the deaths are attributed to what is now commonly referred to as lifestyle diseases.
As Papua New Guineans experience newfound wealth, they spend excessively on activities and food and drink that are most damaging to health.
The number of obese people has increased.
Nobody is walking anymore in towns.
Owning a car or taking a ride in one is the in-thing at the moment.
It is an embarrassment for one to be caught walking.
Government and city and town planners do not help.
Open spaces for leisure and sports are fast being taken over by business development.
Ever-increasing roads are being built for vehicles with no concern or allowances for pedestrians.
With increased new wealth pouring in from the upcoming resource projects, this trend will continue for a while before it is reversed.
The most effective guard against sickness is prevention.
One need not spent large sums of money getting curative therapy in hospitals if
he or she can prevent going to the hospital in the first place.
Government must introduce and sustain large nutrition and healthy lifestyle campaigns on how Papua New Guineans can prevent lifestyle health programmes that contribute to diabetes, high blood pressure and heart attacks.
One need only listen to Maxtone-Graham or a guest he has invited this week, internationally acclaimed diet health guru Dr Gabriel Cousens, to be convinced about the truth of the message.