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WORLD HEALTH ORGANISATION research published today contends that Europe is getting fatter every year, and heading for an obesity crisis.
Nearly all Irish adults are likely to be overweight in 15 years’ time, according to the study.
Gema Fruhbeck, a nutrition expert and president of the executive committee of the European Association for the Study of Obesity, talks about solutions:
Q: Why is the obesity problem so difficult to tackle?
A: Obesity is not like an infection (which can be treated), obesity is something that is going to be with us all of our life.
Technology has made life easy for people, while driving them to be very inactive. Even leisure time is very much related to computer screens and it is necessary to change the mentality of society.
The current economic crisis also has a negative impact, leading low-income people or the unemployed to eat higher-energy food which is cheaper, rather than follow a healthy diet which is more expensive.
It is necessary to collaborate with politicians, urban planners, architects and sociologists to really change the whole framework in which the society addresses the problem of obesity.
Q: What are some nations getting right, such as the Netherlands where levels are on a downward trend?
A: It’s easy to cycle in Holland, which is not the case in many other European countries.
From a political point of view, they are a nation that has been very pre-occupied about initiatives to tackle the obesity problem.
We really need to be pro-active, so unless policy makers make the decision to have an action against obesity, it’s going to be very difficult. And what we are seeing now is almost the opposite since it’s becoming so frequent and so normal, many people tend to downplay the importance of obesity, many people say it’s not a disease.
Q: What would you propose to tackle obesity?
A: We really need to put a lot of effort in educating our children about healthy lifestyle.
Most of our celebrations are related to food, social events where food is important. Try to be able to combine this in the whole of your life, so I’ll have a very nice (meal) with friends, have a great time, but this can also be done by going for a walk and not sitting all day. We need a mentality change.
Taxes on junk food do not work because they penalise people with lower income.
Packaging is very important and so is labelling and telling the people how to read the labels.
Fighting obesity is impossible without realising that obesity is the gateway to ill health.
- © AFP 2015.
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There is nothing more demoralizing than being bullied or intimidated in the workplace.
You want to give 100% to the customer/company and enjoy your job.
But it only takes 1 or 2 sad individuals to destroy any good feelings you have.
It saps your self confidence and ability to give the customer the service they deserve.
It isn’t physical intimidation (these bullies are far too scared to do that) .
It’s the whisper campaigns , doing things they know annoys you, they turn other workers against you and basically make life miserable.
Sad little individuals.
I left a job I truly loved 10 years ago and still regret it.
@Justice Mickey: Same thing happened to me.HR didnt want to know.Ended up having to quit.Found out later he had been asked to leave his previous job for the same thing.Nasty piece of work.
@Trish O’Leary-Dunne: I’ve see it happen. Nasty pieces of work, like you, I reported it in writing, & faced the bully nose to nose, he backed down and moved on to other softer touches, & like you most of these people, packed up & moved on. The Employer lost some fantastic people, & another loser is the Employer.
Moral in my storey is, stand up to the B’ast4rds, they cant handle it when someone puts it up to them. I know that shouldn’t be the way, but in life you gotta do what you gotta do?
@Trish O’Leary-Dunne:
So sorry to read that Trish and hopefully you are in a better place mentally and physically.
Happy New year to you.
@Dom Layzell:
HR are totally useless and toothless, I confronted the ring leader and went Nose to Nose and he was scared shitless but it reverted back once he had his sleveen devious buddies behind him.
Then he made sure there would never be another opportunity.
Bullies are nothing but sad little cowards whit zero personalities or social skills.
They think that by belittling someone they are seen as “The big man/woman”.
I would hate to be in their shoes and be know as a pure looser and be the laughing stock.
In most cases these people turn into miserable old and unwanted people that will die alone and nobody will care.
@Justice Mickey: you’re wrong – it’s bad enough being subjected to bullying but what is even worse is when you bring the matter to the attention of your HR Department as advised & HR then proceeds to ignore their own policies and timelines continuously for months/years on end, while you continue to have to work with the person who bullies you…. that is demoralising & that is what currently goes on in some civil/public service jobs
@Justice Mickey: Thank you.I ended up in a job i love with amazing people so he did me a favour in the end!
Bullying is in every workplace. People with comments, snide remarks, looks, judging, deliberately leaving people out from a conversation or not inviting them to lunch etc. Then these bullies play the victim when a complaint is made, that’s all bullying if you make a person feel uncomfortable. It says so much about the person /people doing it. Some people can make others feel physically sick about going in to work because of the way they are treated and it makes me so mad. But these bullies have other issues you have to remember this.
Quite a misleading headline, at odds with the statistics presented in the body.
11 complaints in 11 months for a force of 14000. Well done to the Gardai. They seem to be well on top of the problem.
Bullying costs lives. It’s incalculable how much decent man and woman hours have been lost to the public, all around the country, through incompetent middle and senior management. Just look at the incompetence of senior management that was exposed through the Maurice McCabe affair. Just look at what came out.
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