Thursday 23 October 2014

The creeping obesity 'epidemic' and the galloping deficit

The best value PT in townTeam shape u
23.10.2014
Day 192



Circuits with Erik at Team Shape U: including NFL touch-down sprints, battle rope siders, bicep curls and presses, blades, T stretch and IYTW stretches £55 12 sessions
Buggy Runners: the outdoor gym
This evening: core session on the track

The amount obesity is costing our beleaguered NHS is all over the news today. There was a heartbreaking interview with a woman who had been 40 stone. The health problems this caused were numerous and ghastly. She said that she had to have carers to do every, single, intimate function for her. The chafing between hanging flaps of skin set up bleeds and infections. The NHS paid for gastric surgery and now she weighs 15 stone.
The trouble is, it costs so much. The Daily Mail flagged up that this woman and her family had cost the health care system more than £1m and she became the target of a hate campaign.
To help individuals before they reach such a desperate condition should be, and is, the duty of health public bodies. Using parks, local exercise initiatives like our Buggy Runners, subsidised as it is in Southwark Park, where I was coach today, and free equipment, such as that The Outdoor Gym Company provides for parks, playgrounds and public spaces will help. These opportunities will only be taken up, however, if they are properly marketed at those for whom social isolation so easily leads to comfort eating and weight gain. 
Exercising is as much about the socialising aspect of being outdoors and active together, as it is about trying to regain your waist. Some of the women I train with are hardly skinny whippets, but they're rosy and energetic and they enjoy their grub. Instead of thinking about the next snack they're going to unwrap, they're finding time to come up to the park for their 8am/10.15am or 7.15pm session. I attended them all today. Over exercising, rather than overeating. It's time to find a balance. 


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