Fighting obesity – a big job

Dr Verity Cleland has a simple, if surprising, career goal – to put herself out of a job

“In Australia, we have a serious problem with obesity and all the associated illnesses like diabetes and heart disease.” she explains. “What we don’t know enough about yet is the underlying factors that are making us overweight.

“If we knew that, well we would not have the need for the dedicated team of people we have at Deakin working at the Centre for Physical Activity and Nutrition.

 “Ultimately, by discovering what all the personal, social and environmental issues are, we will be putting ourselves out of a job.”

That moment though remains a considerable way off for Dr Cleland and her colleagues who make up one of the world’s leading research clusters in physical activity and nutrition research.

One of Dr Cleland’s major research roles since returning to Deakin after completing her PhD in Tasmania is to help fill the vast void of data needed before definitive programs can be created.

“Even some of the data that says we are becoming heavier is more than 10 years old,” Dr Cleland says.  “While we have already put together a lot of information, there are still many gaps in our knowledge.

“We know for instance that adults from disadvantaged backgrounds are less active and have poorer diets than those from more advantaged backgrounds,” she says.

“With children, the picture is not as clear, so one of the things we are trying to determine is at what age these socio-economic influences on physical activity and eating emerge.

“We are following a cohort of children aged 5-6 and 10-12 through a five year period to when they are 10-11 and 15-17 years.

“The emerging evidence seems to suggest that many problems emerge once adolescents leave school.

“This may be an important area we need to target with the right sort of diet and physical education programs.

“Among adults, we know that walking is a great way to keep fit.  What we don’t fully understand yet are what are the disincentives to walking.

“Knowing the neighbours is something that seems to be important for women.  If people feel comfortable with their neighbours, they tend to be more likely to walk.

“We have also found local traffic speed to be another important factor for women’s walking, as well as the number of pedestrian crossings.

“Resilience to physical inactivity is something else we want to learn a lot more about.

“For example, some people are faced with a lot of social and environmental obstacles to having a good diet or taking part in physical activity but manage to overcome these, while others don’t.

“Enjoyment is a factor we’re finding is important.  People need to find a physical activity they enjoy, rather than just take part in something because they are told it is good for them.

“There are many factors that influence physical activity and eating that we need a better understanding of so we can develop strategies specifically targeting these factors.

“About the only thing that is certain is that we are facing a huge health crisis because of the obesity epidemic.

“The cost to the community in medical bills alone is going to be enormous.

“If we are going to reduce those costs and get people more active and enjoying healthier diets, then we must have all the information needed to ensure we have in place the right programs, and that those programs reach the people they need to.”

Dr Cleland won’t be visiting CentreLink for a while yet.

> BACK