For as long as any of us can remember, diabetes has been a major health problem in Jamaica. Now, with November being marked as Diabetes Awareness Month, the experts are saying the situation is getting worse at a frightening rate.

Information provided at this newspaper’s Monday Exchange with health experts show 12 per cent of Jamaicans, 15 years and older, living with the lifestyle disease which is said to be the second leading cause of death here.

Obesity resulting from poor diet and inadequate exercise are leading reasons for diabetes. Hence, the alarm at news that 54 per cent of Jamaicans are overweight and obese while more than 70 per cent have insufficient resources to access safe, adequate, and nutritious food.

Equally disheartening, four out of five, or 82 per cent of Jamaicans are said to have low levels of physical activity.

We hear that “68 per cent of our adolescents are obese and these figures have doubled over the past seven years…”

Additionally, “Three out of four adolescents are consuming one or more sugar sweetened beverages per day, while a quarter of them are physically inactive, and a quarter of them eat fast food three or more days per week…”

All of which is why we hear that, “Jamaica is being set up for a tsunami of diabetes.”

Clearly, as was said at the Jamaica Observer’s offices on Monday, education is crucial to influencing lifestyle changes, including diet and culture.

An important preventive ingredient, it seems to us, is to get young people and adults alike as physically active as possible.

Obviously, the novel coronavirus pandemic which, for a long time, halted outdoor recreational activity for many people negatively affected the situation.

Also, an overwhelming growing concern for many parents and guardians is the increasing reliance of children and young adults on electronic devices, not just for educational aids, but for entertainment — drastically reducing time spent in rigorous physical activity.

We believe a determined effort on the part of the authorities to change that at local and national level would help. In that respect, Health and Wellness Minister Dr Christopher Tufton’s Jamaica Moves programme of a few years back — discredited because of alleged administrative missteps — was a major plus.

A project along those lines, capable of capturing the imagination of young people, would help.

Of course, organised sporting competitions can make a big difference. The trouble here is that far too many school leaders are disinclined to pay attention to physical activity and sport. When they do, it’s often external school competitions, involving elite athletes, with little or no thought to internal activity such as house and form competitions, which would involve the wider student population. Indeed, for some schools, play areas have dwindled significantly with the expansion of classroom space and so forth.

To make matters worse, many community centres — once vibrant venues for sporting activity — are falling apart, due to neglect.

Yet, it seems to us that if we are to avoid the ‘tsunami’ of illness we have been warned about, we must as a people find a way to get our people, more especially our young ones, physically active, en masse, once again.