From The Observer - 8 April 2007
Health fears as Japan falls for fast food
Japan, the home of sushi, seaweed cuisine and the world's longest life expectancy, is rearing a generation of young sugar addicts who are destined to spend their adolescence fighting obesity and acne, according to a report that paints a devastating picture of the country's health crisis.
In Tokyo, the fast food of choice is a towering concoction of four hamburger patties, with all the trimmings, crammed into a single bun and children happily line-up around the block for a calorie-laden doughnut.
But while the queues outside the Krispy Kreme doughnuts in the Shinjuku area of the capital, which opened recently, point to an extraordinary Japanese success story for the fast-food industry, they also symbolise a health disaster in the making for consumers.
Up to a fifth of Japanese children aged from five to 12 who are overweight suffer, or are at risk of developing, metabolic syndrome, a range of symptoms including high cholesterol and large waistlines, according to a study released last week. Left untreated, it can lead to serious illnesses such as strokes and heart disease. Nationwide, the condition afflicts an estimated 23 million Japanese, the health ministry warns.
Although middle-aged 'salarymen' are at greatest risk, children as young as nine are now suffering from type-2 diabetes, a phenomenon unheard of in Japan only a few years ago. Experts say the looming health crisis is being fomented by a surge in demand for highly calorific food sold by the top US food chains.
When Krispy Kreme opened people waited more than an hour to sample its doughnuts - some of which pack several hundred calories each. An estimated 10,000 people visited the restaurant in the first three days.
Cold Stone Creamery, which serves up portions of ice cream mixed with fruit, nuts and biscuits, opened three new outlets in Japan last month and plans to open two more this month, while Burger King is about to launch its second assault on the Japanese market. Last week McDonald's in Japan reported monthly sales of just over 43bn yen (about £183m), the highest in its 36 years in the country. The US chain sold 1.7 million Mega Macs - four burger patties in a bun - in four days in Japan, as outlets struggled to keep up with demand.
Experts blame adults for setting a poor example. 'Ultimately it is up to parents to take greater responsibility for what their children eat,' says Fumi Hayashi, a researcher at the National Institute of Health and Nutrition.
'The problem is that they are just as guilty of bad habits rather than eating a balanced diet.'
Now diseases associated with obesity will strike Japan faster, and with greater ferocity, than anything seen in the West. 'When you have rapid transformations in lifestyles, that's when you see the worst health outcomes,' says Tim Gill, Asia-Pacific regional co-ordinator for the International Obesity Task Force.
The rapid changes taking place in the Japanese diet, combined with a greater susceptibility to metabolic illness, will lead to dramatic rises in strokes, diabetes and hypertension, he warned. 'The potential is there for a disaster.'
In the absence of government intervention - limiting TV advertising aimed at children, or banning special promotions - the fast-food industry is enjoying unprecedented success in Japan. Held responsible for contributing to health problems of American and British children, the same firms are setting their sights on a lucrative market in Asia, the world's most populous region.
Krispy Kreme's marketing machine, combined with the mouth-watering sight of freshly made doughnuts emerging on a conveyor belt, is proving irresistible to Japanese teens. 'Krispy Kreme is the epitome of how to cram maximum calories into the smallest amount of food,' Gill says. 'All you can do with doughnuts is to point out what crap they are.'
More than 1,300 people across the region have had weight reduction surgery since the beginning of last year, according to the Asia Pacific Bariatric [Obesity] Surgical Society.
From the BBC - 12 April 2007
Clear obesity gene link 'found'
Scientists say they have identified the clearest genetic link to obesity yet.
They found people with two copies of a "fat" version of a gene had a 70% higher risk of obesity than those with none, and weighed 3kg (6.5lb) more.
The work in Science by the Peninsula Medical School and Oxford University studied data from about 40,000 people.
The findings suggest that although improving lifestyle is key to reducing obesity, some people may find it harder to lose weight because of their genes.
The authors say their work, funded by the Wellcome Trust, could improve understanding of obesity and eventually help prevent it, as well as an illness it is linked to.
Obesity is associated with an increased risk of type two diabetes, and the investigators first identified the FTO gene when looking for differences between the genomes of people with type two diabetes and people without diabetes.
People with type two diabetes were more likely to have a particular variant of the FTO gene, which was also shown to be linked to increased body weight.
The variant making people fatter differed from the other version of the FTO gene by a single mutation in the DNA sequence.
The team then looked at other studies involving 40,000 people searching for this FTO mutation, and confirmed that it was associated with body weight.
People carrying one copy of the "fat" FTO variant had a 30% increased risk of being obese compared to a person with no copies of that version.
Those carrying two copies of the variant had a 70% increased risk of being obese, and were on average 3kg (6.6lb) heavier than a similar person with no copies.
Professor Andrew Hattersley of the Peninsula Medical School said this could explain why two people can seem to eat the same things and do the same amount of exercise yet one may struggle to lose weight more than the other.
He said: "The typical message has been that if you are overweight it is due to sloth and gluttony and it is your fault.
"This work is suggesting that there is also a genetic component."
And he said although a 3kg difference in weight sounds relatively small, it is enough to make a big change in the risks of obesity.
From the BBC - 22 April 2007
Success for child obesity scheme
A community programme which aims to encourage obese children to be more healthy has proved highly successful, a study has found.
A year after the nine-week programme, the eight to 12-year-olds were fitter healthier, and more confident.
Details of the Mend programme, now running in 100 areas across England, will be presented to an obesity conference in Budapest on Monday.
One expert said the scheme could underpin work to cut childhood obesity.
Around 30% of UK children are now considered to be overweight or obese.
The trial of the Mend programme (which stands for Mind, Exercise, Nutrition, Do-it!) involved 107 moderately obese children.
The programme involves the whole family and aims to teach both parents and children about healthy attitudes and behaviours relating to eating and activity, and to help children see being active as fun. About 1,000 children have now been through the Mend programme.
One of them is Matthew Williams, now 16, who said the fact that his mother, Helen Ball, was also involved in the programme gave him extra confidence.
She said it had taught Matthew, aged 11 at the time, how to eat healthily.
"It involved lessons about nutrition and diet and how to analyse food labels and food items so that you were in control of how much fat, salts and sugar you were taking in so that you could make the right choices," she said.
Over the next three years, it is hoped 26,000 can take part in 300 areas.
Funding for the scheme, which will cost £11m in total, is coming from the Big Lottery Fund, Sainsbury's and Sport England.
Paul Sacher, research director of the programme and an honorary specialist dietician at Great Ormond Street Hospital, said the focus of the programme was not weight loss.
"We do measure them, but their weight is just one of the things we measure. It's more about living healthily."
That is presented to children in ways which they can relate to, such as not being picked last for sport and being able to fit into jeans.
In the study, half were put through the programme, while the rest had no interventions.
After six months, children in the programme had a waist measurement which was, on average, just over 4cm smaller than those in the non-intervention group.
The programme group also had a body mass index measure which was two points lower and did at least three more hours of physical activity per week.
Tests also showed their confidence increased by 10%.
From The Daily Mail - 28 September 2007
Obesity fuelling a 'diabetes epidemic' with 70,000 new cases in a year
Campaigners renewed warnings of a diabetes epidemic yesterday after figures showed the number of patients with the condition shot up by 70,000 last year.
The surge in cases is being fuelled by obesity, say experts.
Health Service statistics show the number of patients in England diagnosed with diabetes jumped from 1,915,605 in 2005-2006 to 1,986,200 in 2006-2007.
This represents an increase in "diabetes prevalence" from 3.6 per cent to 3.7 per cent of patients.
The figures come from the 2006-2007 Quality And Outcomes Framework, which measures what GPs achieve for their patients.
For the first time obesity has been officially recorded by GPs and last year they saw four million obese patients.
The prevalence of obese patients was 7.4 per cent of the 53million registered with family doctors in England.
However, this underestimates the true level because it includes only newly-registered patients and those who were assessed as being obese when they consulted their GPs for other reasons.
Around one in four adults is classified as obese from national surveys.
The charity Diabetes UK said growing levels of obesity are closely linked to the rise in Type 2 diabetes. Around 80 per cent of those with Type 2 are overweight at the time of diagnosis.
The number with Type 2 diabetes is expected to double by 2010. Nine out of ten of those with diabetes have Type 2, which occurs when the body gradually loses the ability to process blood sugar.
Douglas Smallwood, chief executive of Diabetes UK, said: "These figures are truly alarming as diabetes can lead to blindness, kidney failure, heart disease, stroke and nerve damage that can cause amputation.
"We need to encourage people to follow a healthy diet and active lifestyle to help them reduce their risk of developing diabetes.
"Up to 750,000 people have diabetes in the UK and are not aware of it."
