Professor Cecily Kelleher:

It is very important to feel we have the power to make a change. I could give the committee dire projections of what the statistics will be, and we already know there has been a rise in diabetes in the population data. We have heard about the burden of disease happening in the hospital environment but many people have made effective changes. Two decades ago we would still have been dealing with major problems with coronary heart disease related to smoking but we have had a major impact on smoking and now we are dealing with problems related to obesity. We have to take a vigilant approach to public policy to make the changes we need to make.