Obesity and chronic disease: The scary, confronting truth about your child

One in two Queenslanders now live with a chronic illness like obesity or heart disease, painting a grim picture for the future of the state’s children.

Obesity and chronic disease are big risks for our younger generations.

Queensland is facing raising a generation of children who will die younger than their parents did amid soaring rates of obesity and chronic diseases.

That was the stark warning from the leader of the state’s first dedicated prevention agency in charge of reversing our ailing health outcomes.

Health and Wellbeing Queensland CEO Dr Robyn Littlewood said the median age of death in Brisbane had fallen to 82 and in some parts of the Far North were as low as 52.

This is as one in two Queenslanders now live with chronic illnesses like obesity, cardiac disease, stroke, diabetes and cancer.

“If we do nothing, we will get worse and it is predicted that the ‘one’ that has the one in two will have four, five or six chronic diseases,” she said.

Health and Wellbeing Queensland CEO Dr Robyn Littlewood speaking at the QFI Health Forum. Photo: Supplied.

Dr Littlewood said in the late 1990s, type two diabetes in children was unheard of.

Now rates were soaring with children also living with fatty livers and high cholesterol.

Just last week it was revealed by The Courier-Mail that the number of Queensland children injecting prescription drug Ozempic to manage diabetes had risen ten-fold in four years.

“Kids today will live a shorter life than their parents for the first time in Queensland, and you should be outraged at this,” she said.

“In terms of diabetes type two, 90 per cent of it is preventable.

“For heart disease, 80 per cent of it and 40 per cent of cancers are preventable.”

(L-R) QFI Chief Executive Officer Steve Greenwood, KPMG Health, Ageing and Human Services Partner Sarah Abbott, Metro South Health Health Service Chief Executive Noelle Cridland, Translational Research Institute CEO Professor Maher Gandhi, Health and Wellbeing Queensland CEO Dr Robyn Littlewood, University of Southern Queensland Vice-Chancellor Professor Karen Nelson and Novo Nordisk Oceania Senior Medical Director Dr Ana Svensson at the QFI Health Forum at Tattersall's Club. Photo: Supplied.

Speaking at the Queensland Futures Institute’s Solutions for a Healthy State forum in Brisbane, Dr Littlewood said those statistics translated to a shocking 40 per cent of the entire Queensland Health burden being fully preventable.

“We’ve got the best system here in the world, hands down. I’ve got to say, though, the funding model does not help with prevention,” she said.

“For the past six years, we’ve done nothing but think about chronic diseases and the way that we can target SNAPO (smoking, nutrition, alcohol, physical activity and obesity).

“It wouldn’t be a panel in 2025 if we didn’t talk about (Brisbane) 2032 so I feel like these are the things that we can get so right and then show the data by 2032 because all eyes are going to be on Queensland.”

Dr Littlewood said Queenslanders were looking for quick solutions and a 24-7 “Amazon” model of care including free access to health coaching online.

She said the “Wellness My Way” pilot programs in Roma, Bundaberg and Logan had seen hundreds of users engage to improve their health in their own time.

Another lifestyle management program created by UQ Health Care, Logan Healthy Living, had resulted in a 10 per cent reductions in hospital admissions and hospital bed days, and a 30 per cent reduction in emergency presentations in the local area.

Metro South Health Health Service Chief Executive Noelle Cridland told the forum another huge hurdle to overcoming poor health outcomes was the attrition of staff and the increasing number only wanting to work part-time, including 75 per cent of nurses and midwives.

She said hospitals were trialling the use of artificial intelligence to transcribe medical discussions with patients to reduce the burden of documenting medical records, letters to GPs and take home notes.

They are also exploring in which cases clinicians other than doctors, like physiotherapists and nurses, could better treat patients or even prescribe medicines to prevent ramping.

University of Southern Queensland Vice-Chancellor Professor Karen Nelson said attracting and retaining medical staff in the regions was also a focus area.

Of a recent intake of 33 students to a first of its kind remote nursing program in Charleville, 80 per cent went on to continue working in the area.

“It’s only one very small initiative that we need to replicate across all of our health disciplines,” Prof Nelson said.

Originally published as Obesity and chronic disease: The scary, confronting truth about your child