Lifestyle diseases hitting Pacific islands: Doctor

By DOROTHY MARK
LIFESTYLE diseases are killing a lot of people in Pacific island countries annually because of unhealthy diets, lack of physical activities, smoking and alcohol consumption, a doctor says.
Health director of the South Pacific Division of the Seventh-Day Adventist Church Dr Chester Kuma said during the church’s one-week health expo in Madang that a report by the International Diabetes Foundation in 2013 revealed that 35 million people worldwide died from lifestyle diseases annually, with PNG and Pacific island nations accounting for a good percentage.
The diseases include stroke, heart attack, cancer and high blood pressure.
He said many people in PNG and the South Pacific had replaced healthy garden food, including nuts, fruits and vegetables, with processed canned food, white rice and bread.
He said such foreign food contained oxidants which contributed to growing fats in the body.
“When these fats block the blood veins, people die from heart attack, get stroke or develop cancer,” Kuma said.