Hanover’s health officer troubled over parish’s high level of NCDs
Published:Tuesday | October 15, 2024 | 12:09 AMBryan Miller/Gleaner Writer
Western Bureau:
Dr Kaushal Singh, the medical officer of health for Hanover, says he is concerned about the high rate of non-communicable diseases (NCDs) in the parish, describing the situation as a ‘silent epidemic’.
“We are going through a silent epidemic in this parish. Hanover has one of the highest burdens of diabetes, hypertension and obesity; we are top in terms of the prevalence of obesity in both females and males,” Singh said while giving his report during last Thursday’s monthly meeting of the Hanover Municipal Corporation.
According to Singh, his concerns about obesity are borne out in the latest Jamaican Health and Lifestyle Survey, which has listed the parish as having the highest percentage of obesity cases for persons over 15 years old, both males and females. Males are at 22.9 per cent of the population while females are at 45 per cent.
“If you look at the prevalence of diabetes, we are highest in the country, with 17.3 per cent of our population diabetic. Hanover also has the second highest burden of hypertensive population, with 43.6 per cent. With that, we can say comfortably that one person in every two in this parish is hypertensive,” said Singh.
Emphasising the need for precaution, Singh said the prevalence of those NCDs must be cauterised, noting that the Hanover Health Department has embarked on several outreach and health awareness programmes.
“These messages, we have been carrying to our communities over the year. We did different outreaches [and] our focus has been different public sector workforces, as well as schools, and our teams are always ready to educate if we get requests from other organisations such as churches and other community dwellers. We are ready to educate,” said Singh.
He further explained that the health department has recruited three new health promotion and education officers, along with one social worker, to boost its workforce in carrying the message across the parish.
LIFE ESSENTIAL ACTIVITIES
Singh outlined eight life essential activities which he advised members of the Hanover community to follow to reduce the prevalence of the NCDs.
The activities are: eat better, be more active, quit tobacco, get healthy sleep, manage your weight, control cholesterol, manage blood sugar and manage blood pressure.
“The health sector by itself cannot do anything, the population needs to come forward and help in fighting this epidemic,” said Singh. “The Hanover Health Department is urging the residents to join in the effort to fight this silent epidemic of chronic non-communicable diseases ... make an effort to know your baseline health information, and follow the life essential advice given by the health department.”