Malnutrition and obesity, two faces of the same coin

Our planet produces food enough for the entire population. The problem of hunger in the world is reduced to a poor distribution of food. These two statements are not a desire, but a reality corroborated by FAO. But that same bad distribution that makes much of humanity malnourished is leading to a growing number of people into a potentially dangerous disease: obesity. "We already knew that the world produced enough food for all - says Barbara Burlingame, top official of the Group's estimation and evaluation of the impact of nutrition of the FAO-. Unfortunately, food not always reach those who need them most".

Obesity carries a greater presence of chronic diseases such as diabetes, cancer and heart diseases. Giving the case that some people in the poorest countries are ample weight, that does not mean that they are well fed. Obesity often conceals deficiencies of vitamins and minerals both in poor countries and the rich. "We consider obesity a major problem you need to treat, as well as the problem of the Sub-feed lug", says Prakash Shetty, Chief of the service of planning, estimation and evaluation of the nutrition of FAO. This statement would have been considered a joke a few years ago, when the effort to eradicate hunger in the world was so big that any thought to avoid the evils resulting from overfeeding seemed a waste of time. But today all countries face malnutrition and obesity as two sides of the same coin, both avoidable and costly health and human lives.

Of the 815 million people suffering from hunger in the world, 780 million are in the least developed countries, but the data presented by the Worldwatch Institute put into question classical thought: for the first time in history, the number of people supercharged the world equals the number of the undernourished. Developing countries have swelled the ranks of countries facing the problem of obesity. In Togo, where nearly 10% of the population has a lower than normal weight, it has almost 20% of people with excess weight. As in Ghana, with percentages of 20% in both cases.

In all regions, obesity seems to grow as incomes increase. The population used to live in rural means, which will perform very hard physical labor and the power base is in vegetables, cereals and legumes, stays away from the problem of the accumulation of fat. The population in the cities adopts the sedentary lifestyle and "junk food" imported from countries that represent modernity and progress. In China, the number of overfed people increased from almost 10% to 15% in three years. In Brazil and Colombia, the figure is around 40%, comparable level with various European countries. Even in sub-Saharan Africa obesity is increasing, especially among the urban female population.

Among the diseases that obesity exacerbates or directly cause is diabetes, various types of cancer, cardiovascular and circulatory, problems given the increase in saturated fat and sugar, and the disappearance of dietary fiber. Also the increase in body mass that prevents the exercise requires the obese to an unhealthy sedentary lifestyle. And though from old intake of excess calories is identified with good nutrition, today we know that this is not true. High calorie diets often lead to a shortage of vitamins and minerals as a result of the reduction or elimination of fruits and vegetables in the diet. And this shortage of micronutrients also produces disease and lack of health. Both deficiency and excess shorten life expectancy and lower levels of productivity, which, for a country that wants to get out of underdevelopment, and you can only get it by increasing their work force, is economically disastrous.

The capacity of impoverished countries is limited. The health policy makers cannot access the data necessary to assess properly the risk of obesity and associated chronic diseases increased. We must have the wrong idea that obesity is a problem that is only up to the rich countries may be delaying research and decision-making. The first step to solving a problem is to accept their existence, also in some poor countries.

Any public health policy that you want to be economic should promote good nutrition and physical activity through campaigns directed at the entire population. It's not only more abundant and more healthy foods.

Arancha Desojo
Pharmaceutical and health cooperation expert
http://www.ucm.es/info/solidarios/