Bridgetown
Too many Barbadians are overweight and obese according to statistics provided by Professor Trevor Hassell, the Chairman of the National Commission for Non Communicable Diseases.
The firgures showed a third of all women in Barbados are obese, three fifths are overweight,while one third of all Barbadian men are overweigh and one man in ten is obese.
Hassell told the media that one -fifth of the population.54,000 Barbadians suffered from hypertension or high blood pressure.
"For goodness sake, we are a population of 280,00, and 54,000 of them have got high blood pressure. By the time you get to 65 years and over, two thirds, meaning two in every three persons will have high blood pressure",he said.
"When these those figures were broken down further,it was one third of all all adults between the ages of 15 and 45 and one half of older adults between the ages of 45 and 65", he added.
"Here is the big deal of all these numbers, only 30 percent have their blood pressure controlled.This is despite the fact that Barbados National Formulary (BNF) has more than 40 different types of drugs to treat high blood pressure. Can you imagine anything that is more cost ineffective that"? he asked.
