BAD food options and a lazybones lifestyle are adding up for Singaporeans – we are getting fatter.

The experts are worried and no wonder, with about one in three people here overweight or obese.

And more than one in two are considered at risk of health complications because of their weight, when Asians’ higher body-fat content compared with Caucasians is taken into account.

Obese people are more likely to suffer from a host of diseases ranging from stroke, heart disease and type 2 diabetes to certain cancers and osteoarthritis. They are also more likely to die from a disease.

“This is already a very serious issue, and the figures are going to go up,” said Dr Tham Kwang Wei, director of the obesity and metabolic unit at the Singapore General Hospital’s Lifestyle Improvement and Fitness Enhancement (Life) Centre.

Endocrinologist Tai E Shyong, working with other researchers here, has published about 10 research papers on various aspects of obesity.

One unexpected finding when researchers looked at weight gain over time was that people here gained the most weight in early adulthood to middle age. Over one in three people who became overweight were aged 30 to 39.

“Early intervention is terribly important,” said Dr Tai, a clinician-scientist and consultant at the National University Hospital endocrinology division.

“It’s much easier to stop people from gaining weight than it is to help them lose weight, as the body tends to defend itself against weight loss.”

Since the weight gain happened at a time when people tended to be focusing on making money, their family, careers and leisure time, he suggested that encouraging people to have a healthy lifestyle should not get in the way of such goals.

Another idea was to reach out to operationally ready national servicemen through their contact with the armed forces, to stress the importance of a healthy diet and physical activity.

Economist Eric Finkelstein, who specialises in obesity, said obese people in the United States incur 35 per cent to 40 per cent more in medical costs than their normal-weight counterparts.

He found that the price tag for medical spending attributed to overweight and obese patients accounted for 9.1 per cent of total annual US medical expenditures in 1998 and may have been as high as US$78.5 billion.
 
They also miss more time at work, reducing productivity, said Dr Finkelstein, deputy director of the Health Services and Systems Research Programme at Duke-NUS Graduate Medical School. “The more severely obese a person is, the more costs go up,” he added.

Weight issues combined with ageing will be the most serious health problem Singapore will face, added Dr Sum Chee Fang, director of Alexandra Hospital’s diabetes centre, and senior consultant physician and endocrinologist.

“If you are obese and do live to old age, it will be a huge burden.”