09-05-2013: The City’s ambitious healthy lifestyle campaign to ease the burden of the ailing health system
Unhealthy lifestyle choices and bad eating habits is one of the significant contributors to burden and challenges country’s public health is facing. The burden of South Africa’s health system is more than just TB and HIV.
“We are sitting on a silent time bomb when it comes to diseases of lifestyle” said the Executive Mayor, Clr Mpho Parks Tau at his State of the City address today
According to STATS SA, heart diseases (includes hypertension, ischemic heart disease, stroke) accounted for 12.3% and diabetes 3.1% of the ten leading natural causes of death in Johannesburg in 2010. (The Gauteng totals were 14.3% for Heart Diseases and 3.5% for Diabetes.) The proportion of Years of Life Lost (YLL) due to premature death caused by non-communicable diseases (chronic diseases of lifestyle) was 35.2% for Johannesburg in 2008. (HIV/TB: 23.5%; Communicable diseases (excluding HIV & TB) & Maternal, perinatal and nutritional disorders: 29.2%; Injuries: 12.1%). This means that chronic lifestyle diseases are a major threat to the well being of our city’s population.
According to the World Health Organisation, “the health and welfare, present and future, of children of school age are greatly conditioned by the kind of food provided and by maintaining a healthy weight”.
The reason for GoJozi - the City’s healthy lifestyle promotion programme,
is that the city has uncovered the silent threat of lifestyle diseases during the Joburg 2040 outreach process.
South Africa is experiencing a quadruple burden of disease and these are:
- HIV and TB;
- maternal and child mortality;
- Non-communicable diseases; and
- Violence, injuries and trauma.
“We cannot let this silent threat erode the quality of life of our citizens. For this reason we are scaling up our advocacy programmes in the city. Prevention is better than cure” said Clr Tau.
The following are targeted programmes the City is focusing on:
- On-going health promotion activities to encourage communities to adopt a healthier lifestyle. These include healthy eating, exercising for at least 30 minutes a day, stop smoking and limit or no alcohol use.
- Having fun walks and open days where screening of chronic diseases of lifestyle is undertaken. (Hypertension, Diabetes mellitus, HIV testing, Screening for common cancers [prostate & cervical cancers)
- Support groups at fixed facilities also assist in educating one another or share disease related information during their meetings.
- Outreach services on health promotion are conducted at senior citizen’ clubs meetings and on a larger scale during campaigns within the community.
- The City has a responsibility to make sure that the people’s living experience is enriched by creating better infrastructure that will encourage ease of movement and inculcate a healthier lifestyle through more people taking up cycling, walking and road running as recreational activities and ways to move around.
To date the City has partnering with organisations such as the Virgin Active, Dischem, Oxygen for Life, Nedbank, Old Mutual, Moso Consulting, Ekhayalethu Health Centre, Road Show Marketing and Green Outdoor Gym to mobilise and educate the public on the benefit of living a healthy balanced lifestyle and reduce the risk of developing chronic diseases.
ENDS
