The Hindu : 20 lakh people die each year due to lack of exercise

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, Apr 07, 2002

Southern States

Southern States - Karnataka-Bangalore

20 lakh people die each year due to lack of exercise

By Our Staff Reporter

Bangalore April 6. The Health Minister. A.B. Maalakaraddy today said that more than 20 lakh people died of non-communicable diseases such as diabetes and cardiac problems in the country every year due to insufficient physical activity.

The minister told presspersons here that the Department of Health and Family Welfare, as part of World Health Day tomorrow, would organise a procession from the Vidhana Soudha to the Town Hall to drive home the importance of physical activity to control blood pressure, healthy food habits, and avoiding tobacco use.

"Move for Health" is the theme this year to prevent diseases brought on by lack of exercise. According to a report of the World Health Organisation, if the same situation prevailed, about 70 per cent of deaths would be due to such diseases by 2020. Dr. Maalakaraddy, a practising doctor himself, said that 30 minutes of daily physical exercise was required to stay healthy.

He said that educational material such as handbills, folders, posters, stickers and banners had been supplied to all the districts. Tomorrow's procession would be followed by a check-up for diabetes and hypertension for the public.

He said the redrafted Nursing Homes (Control) Bill would be introduced later, as there were some objections to the original Bill from professional organisations. To a question, he said disallowing private practice by government doctors would exacerbate the problem of doctors staying away from government hospitals.

He said more than 3,000 government doctors had offered to take voluntary retirement. Apart from this, the minister said the government hospitals required 333 specialists in different disciplines, but none was applying for the posts because of the demand for their services in private hospitals.

On privatising primary health centres, Dr. Maalakaraddy said that they would be handed over to those who had experience in running hospitals. The department would continue to meet the expenses for salaries, drugs, etc. Scrutiny committees would be constituted to look into applications for running district- and taluk-level hospitals.

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