Despite the visual increase in joggers, hikers and cyclists on our roads and promenades, the obesity problem is not getting any better. Malta has tipped the scales as the fattest population in the European Union, according to a report by the World Health Organisation. Nearly 70 per cent of men and 60 per cent of women over the age of 18are overweight.
The Today Public Policy Institute was even more succinct: Malta is one of the fattest, laziest and most car-dependent nations on the planet. In a report on the environmental dimension of the island’s ill health, the institute said it was the result of “the failure of successive government administrations and health authorities to recognise that encouraging a healthy, physically active lifestyle on a nationwide basis is a good investment”.
The report suggested a new perspective that focused on prevention and public health, rather than disease and morbidity: “If we inculcated good health habits, practices, exercise, healthy diet and stress relief, we could be saving millions in the long run,” it said.
It will have to be a long run indeed until this country gets out of the rut it is in. Malta’s bulging waistlines recently featured on The New York Times, which would have been embarrassing for the country were it not for the fact that, by the newspaper’s own admission, Americans are heavier on average than Maltese. But that doesn’t lighten the problem.
During a meeting with the Medical Association of Malta, Opposition leader Simon Busuttil said the Healthy Living Bill, the result of a private member’s Bill moved by Nationalist MP Robert Cutajar, was the first of its type and focused specifically on combatting obesity.
The Bill became law yesterday, approved unanimously.
Speaking in Parliament a year ago, Dr Busuttil had described the Bill as an advanced, comprehensive law that no other European country had proposed before. That may be, but no other European country is as fat either. Nevertheless, it is a private Bill that has come to fruition, which has seen both sides of the House cooperating positively on doing what is right and on an issue becoming increasingly urgent.
The Opposition leader had much more to tell the doctors’ union. He was particularly concerned at the privatisation of a number of hospitals, in particular Gozo General Hospital. He complained there was little information available on the opening of Barts Medical School and how this would affect medical students at the University of Malta.
The irony of his words could not be more apparent. The two sides of the House have managed to come together over an obesity law but when it comes to actual health policy in general, in the national interest, then there is secrecy, distrust and pique.
The ‘controversy’ over cardiologist and Nationalist MP Albert Fenech’s involvement in the privatised St Luke’s Hospital is yet another example of how shallow the political debate on health can become, to the detriment of citizens, of course.
National health policy can never be short-term and cooperation or, at least, cross-party consensus, is the best way forward. That involves political maturity and trust. Unfortunately, that seems to be a rare commodity here.
The government’s ambitious plans are being released in slow doses, giving rise to concern and apprehension, not just among the people directly involved but also among patients and the public who, at some point in time, will probably all need to access public health care services.