South Africans ‘eating themselves sick’
CAPE TOWN — Many South Africans are eating themselves sick and do not even know it, according to preliminary findings of a study conducted by the University of Cape Town’s Chronic Diseases in Africa Initiative and the Medical Research Council.
The study has yet to be subjected to peer review or published, but offers a fascinating glimpse into the misconceptions some people hold about the health benefits — or otherwise — of their food.
It also suggests that health experts who hope to reduce the nation’s burden of lifestyle-associated diseases such as diabetes and hypertension by getting people to change their eating habits, face a tough task.
Ideally, many chronic diseases should be managed in part with dietary changes such as consuming less processed food, which tends to be high in fat, sugar and salt. But the preliminary findings of the research suggest that even when people are diagnosed with a disease such as diabetes or hypertension, the rest of their family rarely switch to healthier food.
“We don’t see the point of it. We think we are not going to be diabetic (like him). So we cook his healthy food and we enjoy the (fun) food,” said one respondent.
Many people said brown sugar was healthier than white (it is not), or believed a healthy diet should exclude spices (only readymade spice mixtures laden with salt and preservatives pose a potential problem), the researchers found.
“This (study) was meant to provide background information to why people eat the way they do, and the barriers and challenges they (face) in eating healthily,” Annelize de Villiers, the principal investigator, said yesterday.
“We found very few people who said you have to eat healthily to prevent chronic disease … and very few people said it was especially important for your children,” Ms de Villiers said. Many participants were convinced a healthy diet was tasteless, expensive and unsatisfying, she said.
The research included 167 people from 23 focus groups in cities in Gauteng, the Western Cape, the Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal. The participants were in the lowto middle-income bracket. The scientists also questioned nutritionists at academic institutions.