Jimmy Deenihan (Kerry North, Fine Gael)

I am glad to have an opportunity to contribute to this debate on diabetes, given its increasing prevalence. Approximately 250,000 people are affected by this illness and, as previous speakers have said, we should have a national diabetes strategy. Primary, secondary and tertiary care remain generally unsupported in this country. Deputy Reilly, who has experience in this area, pointed out that patients do not have timely access to consultant diabetologists. In addition, diabetes multi-disciplinary teams are understaffed and under-resourced. Other services are unavailable, including a diabetic retinopathy screening programme, while primary care for diabetes is generally unsupported.

The report of the diabetes expert advisory group was completed and submitted to the HSE in September 2007. It is crucial that this report's recommendations should be published and implemented as a priority. We also need to develop a national diabetes patient register. The mobile diabetic retinopathy screening service in the north-west was not expanded, despite the fact that funding was set aside for such an expansion in both 2007 and 2008. This highlights the lack of support for, and possibly indifference to, the issue of diabetes. Deputy Reilly asked where this funding went. There is a need to consider the roll-out of a national diabetic retinopathy screening programme.

I wish to refer to the connection between diabetes and obesity. Given my background as a physical education teacher, for a number of years I have been highlighting the link between obesity and other illnesses, including cardiovascular illnesses. There has been an alarming increase in the prevalence of type 2 diabetes, which is now manifesting itself in our children. That is directly related to increasing levels of obesity. It is obvious that people are getting fatter and while efforts are being made to combat obesity, unfortunately they are not good enough.

Deputy Reilly referred to the report of the obesity task force, which made some 126 recommendations. Interestingly, some people without direct responsibility for Departments, put in place a number of these measures. They have lived up to their expectations, but the Government has failed dismally. I have put a number of questions to various Departments about implementing the recommendations of the obesity task force report, but there has been no commitment whatsoever. There was a commitment in that report that the Department of the Taoiseach would be responsible for co-ordinating the implementation of the recommendations. I asked the Taoiseach about this at question time but he knew nothing about it. This is regrettable because we could have become leaders in this field. We could still become leaders in fighting obesity, but unfortunately the will is not there.

We are going through an unprecedented economic challenge, but combating obesity would cost very little, while saving us a lot of money in the future. As things stand, we are storing up health problems for the future. We are sitting on a medical time-bomb if we do not address the problem of obesity and its connection to diabetes. There seems to be little or no understanding, commitment or general policy on the Government's part to tackle this matter.

According to the statistics, approximately 39% of the population are overweight — that breaks down as 46% of men and 33% of women. One in five, or 18% of the adult population, is obese. This is an alarming statistic. More men are affected by obesity than women. Ireland has the fourth highest prevalence of excess weight and obesity in men in the European Union, and the seventh highest prevalence in women. Those statistics are stark.

Research shows that childhood obesity is associated with a higher chance of premature death and disability in adulthood. Globally, in 2005, 20 million children under the age of five were overweight. On the island of Ireland, one in ten children aged between five and 12 is overweight while a further one in ten is obese. In total, 22% of seven to 12 year olds is overweight or obese. The taskforce report stated up to 300,000 children could be obese in the near future as numbers increase by 10,000 per annum. It is a crisis and must be tackled.

The UK Government recently launched a major campaign against obesity. There is a direct link between obesity and diabetes. A study from the Health and Social Care Information Centre shows that an obese woman is almost 13 times more likely to develop type 2 diabetes than a woman who is not obese. Another finding was that the prevalence of doctor diagnosed diabetes was related to increases in body mass index and raised waist circumference. Men and women who are overweight are more likely to report doctor diagnosed diabetes, 5% of men and 3% of women, than men and women of normal weight, both 2%, while obese men and women were most likely to have doctor diagnosed diabetes, 10% and 9% respectively. Both men and women with a raised waist circumference were more than four times as likely to have doctor diagnosed diabetes as those without a raised weight circumference. These are the most up-to-date findings.

Some years ago I did a survey on the lack of physical education in schools. Some schools are making a real effort to combat obesity through physical education but it is not the case in all. Tralee CBS has made great progress in this area and it should be used as a pilot project for the rest of the country's schools.

There is an emerging obesity epidemic among young people. Statistics from the UK show that by the 2050, 60% of men, 40% of women and a quarter of children under 16 could be obese. We are looking for a cross-party consensus to address this. It is one problem which all politicians can tackle together. I am willing to join with the Minister of State, Deputy Wallace, in addressing this issue for the good of future generations because of my background in physical education and keeping up my interest in it since I left teaching.

In recessions, people tend to eat less healthy foods. More young people, because they will not have access to healthy foods, will eat fattening and energy-dense foods which will lead to obesity problems. In bad economic times, people tend to be more down and eat more comfort foods. Obesity will be on the increase and linked to that will be an increase in type 2 diabetes.

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