THE state of the health profile of the Jamaican population has led Health and Wellness Minister Dr Christopher Tufton to conclude that the country is in a crisis, as some citizens are now forced to adjust their lifestyles due to health challenges.

Tufton was speaking at Thursday’s launch of the Heart Foundation of Jamaica’s (HFJ’s) ‘Out of Our Schools’ mass media campaign, which is designed to promote healthy eating habits and physical activities among the nation’s children.

The campaign message targets the 23 per cent of Jamaican children who are said to be overweight and obese, as well as push for the removal of unhealthy foods and beverages from schools.

The health minister explained that with the implementation of the school nutrition policy and health campaigns such as the one developed by HFJ, there is still hope for children to make better food and beverage choices for longer life.

“If you examine the health profile of our population, we are in a crisis which, if we were to be blunt, there is actually a lost generation around that crisis — a cohort of citizens who unfortunately will have to spend the rest of their lives trying to make themselves as comfortable as they can but will never be the same in terms of being healthy, in terms of productivity, in terms of time they can spend with their family and friends,” said Tufton.

“There is almost a lost generation where the horse has bolted, gone through the gate. The most we can do is build out hospital beds to give them a sense of comfort. It is a tragic way to look at it, but it is the reality. Our children still have hope of a better life, a fulsome life, a productive life, a life that has a better probability of existing up until age 70, 75 or beyond,” he added.

According to Tufton, adults have a duty to give children the best possible chance to fulfil lifelong experiences with healthy food choices.

“This will now hopefully bring to the fore the kind of conversation [on the school nutrition policy] as to why our children deserve this opportunity, why we have an obligation to give it to them,” he said.

Noting that the media campaign is not a restriction, Tufton said it pitches stakeholder interest between those who want the freedom to express their creative talents in the forms of products and others who are against the items being sold.

“The real issue is that it is a campaign around nutrition and I believe there is a bigger sell because every single one of us represent a child, whether foster parent or maternal, and I believe emotional appeal around wanting the best for your child by giving the best nutrition is perhaps the most substantial message that we can advance to those who may be thinking otherwise,” he said.

At the same time, executive director at HFJ Deborah Chen stressed that there is a need to reflect the support for a healthy diet in schools.

“Long gone are the days when non-communicable diseases such as hypertension and type 2 diabetes are viewed as old people diseases. You just have to ask paediatricians who are lamenting that they are now seeing these diseases in their offices, and this is a great cause for concern,” said Chen.

“There is a direct correlation between the food our children eat and the health of our nation. Echoes of ‘Let children be children because we did the same thing as children and nothing neva do we’ are gone,” she added.