Experts: Obesity More Dangerous Than Terrorism

Sydney, Australia (AHN) - Experts raised the warning flag on the public health concerns, saying that the attention being given to terrorist threats must also be given to obesity and other "lifestyle diseases" that are killing millions of people.

Speaking at the Oxford Health Alliance Summit held Monday in Sydney, experts said that while international terrorism is indeed a threat, it is less dangerous compared to the results and the risks posed by such conditions as diabetes, obesity, heart complications, and smoking-related illnesses.

"Ever since September 11, we've been lurching from one crisis to the next, which has really frightened the public," Lawrence Gostin, a U.S. health professor, told the AFP.

"While we've been focusing so much attention on that, we've had this silent epidemic of obesity that's killing millions of people around the world, and we're devoting very little attention to it and a negligible amount of money."

The OHA summit, Building a Healthy Future. took note of the World Health Organization prediction that the next decade will witness the deaths of 388 million people due to chronic diseases - something that was responded to by what Gostin called "a political paralysis."

The alliance's executive director Stig Pramming said that health risks such as SARS, HIV/AIDS, bird flu, bioterrorism and climate change, need attention as well

"However," he said, "it is preventable chronic disease that will send health systems and economies to the wall."

The AAP reported that the summit unveiled the Sydney Resolution, which called attention to smoking, lack of exercise, and poor diet, the three identified causes of chronic diseases. The resolution also called for environments that promoted healthier activities, such as walking and cycling.

"The way we live now is making people sick," stated the resolution." "It is also making our planet sick. It is not sustainable."

The three-day summit convenes experts of business, law, economics, and urban planning.