Eugenia Bratu, public health and management primary doctor, head of the Section for health promotion within the INSP, sounds an alarm about the life expectancy of Romanians, which she said is 8 years shorter than the European average. The main cause is unhealthy food.
Doctor Eugenia Bratu, from the National Institute of Public Health (INSP), spoke on Wednesday evening, on Medika TV, about the information and education campaign carried out at the national level in relation to the promotion of healthy eating.
“The campaign is carried out as part of a national health promotion and assessment program, a program funded by the Ministry of Health. The National Institute of Public Health methodologically prepares this campaign. With the help of the Public Health Directorates, the activities within the campaign are implemented, and the DSPs, in turn, make partnerships with various institutions, various actors to get involved in promoting the message further, that we want to reach in people with these information related to nutrition, related to physical activity. Most of the time, for these campaigns, partnerships are concluded with school inspectorates, with schools”, said Dr. Eugenia Bratu, according to News.ro.
The doctor drew attention to the state of health of Romanians and emphasized that Romanians live, on average, 8 years less than other Europeans.
“I would like to tell you that campaigns do not always start from nothing. They start from a concrete health situation. We look first of all at what are the causes of death in our country, what are the causes of morbidity in our country, what is the worst. And we see that Romanians live less than those in other countries, for example compared to the average of the European Union. We live almost 8 years less, that is, life expectancy. The main cause of death here are cardiovascular diseases, compared to, I don't know, other developed countries where people die from dementia or because they reach very old ages. In our country, practically, we die earlier, with days to come”, the doctor also declared.
According to Eugenia Bratu, in this context, the authorities must determine “how we get to these diseases, what causes these diseases to appear”.
“In this way, we saw that several risk factors are involved in these diseases that occur most frequently and that also lead to death among the population”, Eugenia Bratu said.
“Among all the risk factors, the biggest impact here in Romania is given by food”
One of the reasons why Romanians have a shorter life span is the unhealthy diet.
“Among the most important risk factors, the first is an unbalanced, unhealthy diet. I mean, of all the risk factors, the biggest impact for us in Romania is given by diet, nutrition. And then we want to see how we are doing with nutrition, what principles of healthy eating we follow or don't follow. We went to the youth area, because there we have urgent problems, we will see, with obesity, overweight”, he added declared the doctor.
Eugenia Bratu reported that, although we should consume fruits, “the reality is that, among teenagers, at 11-15 years old, we have a small proportion of those who consume fruits and vegetables”.
Only 33% of teenagers in this age group in Romania consume fruit, compared to 38% worldwide.
“We consume a lot of sweets every day”
Also, the consumption of sweets is very high in Romania.
“We consume many sweets daily, including chocolate, especially chocolate. If worldwide 3 out of 10 girls consume sweets daily, in Romania 5 out of 10 girls consume sweets daily. Worldwide 2 out of 10 boys, and in Romania 3 out of 10 boys. In our country, more consume sweets daily”, Eugenia Bratu said.
INSP runs, in September and October, the “Be active, eat healthy!” campaign, with the theme of promoting healthy eating and physical activity. The data provided by the specialists are worrying – at the European level, almost one in three school-aged children is overweight and one in eight suffers from obesity. In Romania, the average prevalence of overweight in boys and girls among primary school children (aged between 7-9 years) is 28%, and of obesity 12%.
Four million Romanians are fighting with “a disease for which we do nothing” and for which they are adopted. What solutions does the state offer them? “As a family doctor, I have nowhere to send them”
