The Heart Foundation is taking aim at people with “grabbable guts” in Darwin, the capital city with the worst combined ranking for obesity and physical inactivity in Australia.
On Tuesday the Foundation joined with the Northern Territory Government to launch its Live Lighter campaign, which will involve advertisements running on TV and radio, and a Darwin bus wrapped with health messages.
“We [Darwin] are the most overweight and obese, and the least physically active of any Australian capital city,” Simon Dixon from the Heart Foundation said.
The campaign will highlight the damage that having an unhealthy weight, poor diet and lack of physical activity can have on the body.
“Its time to take a direct approach and demonstrate the link between a grabbable gut and chronic disease,” Mr Dixon said.
He said about 105,000 Territorians were carrying around a “grabbable gut” – a gut that has so much fat it can be grabbed.
Percentage of people insufficiently active in each capital city
- Darwin: 63.5
- Adelaide: 59.4
- Hobart: 57.8
- Perth: 53.7
- Melbourne: 54.9
- Brisbane: 53.5
- ACT: 50.5
- Sydney: 52.6
*Source: Australian Health Survey
Darwin ranks as the worst Australian capital city for a combined index of obesity and insufficient physical activity.
About 26.8 per cent of people in Darwin are obese, and 63.5 per cent are not active enough, according to the latest Australian Health Survey results, which covers the period from 2011 to 2013.
Territorians will be urged to swap sugary drinks for tap water as part of the Heart Foundation’s campaign
Mr Dixon said people who consume just one 600 millilitre soft drink each day for one year they would ingest about 23 kilograms of sugar.
“If you are not burning off that energy that stores as toxic fat in your body and around your vital organs,” Mr Dixon told 105.7 ABC Darwin.