Organisations unite…

…in the fight against chronic disease

A group of European organisations on chronic disease have formed an alliance to campaign for the introduction of actions to address the main chronic disease risk factors. These include poor diet, lack of physical activity, smoking and excessive alcohol consumption. With diseases such as diabetes, respiratory disease, liver disease, cancer, heart disease and kidney disease accounting for 86% of deaths in Europe according to the World Health Organisation, the coalition of organisations feel more measures need to be taken.

The recommendations appear in a campaign document entitled A Unified Prevention Approach and included:

• Nutrition: Make efforts to reduce fat, sugar and salt content in food, increase supply and access to affordable fresh fruit and vegetables, ban the marketing of unhealthy food to children.
• Physical activity: Ensure children have access to physical education every day at school and improve PE facilities, set urban planning priorities for non-motorised transport and parks.
• Tobacco: Harmonise tobacco taxation across Europe, devote 80 per cent of cigarette packaging to visual health warnings, ban internet sales of tobacco and cigarette vending machines.
• Alcohol consumption: Ban alcohol advertising on television and radio, introduce uniform minimum EU taxes on alcohol and create educational programmes to raise awareness of excessive alcohol consumption.
• Human and financial costs

The report also stresses that chronic diseases place an unsustainable financial burden on health care budgets, as well as having individual human costs.

Sources: Diabetes UK and Medical News Today, 19 July 2010.

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