Intensive efforts by the health authorities to fight obesity in the country have started delivering results with the prevalence of the condition among adults remaining at an average of 30 percent, without any noticeable increase over the past four years, says an expert at the Hamad Medical Corporation (HMC).
The number of bariatric (weight lose) surgeries has also not increased, remaining between 800 and 1,000 per year, Dr Moataz M Bashah, Director, Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery at HMC told The Peninsula.
“There are different studies and surveys about the prevalence of obesity in Qatar, but the average is 30 percent and it is stable for last three to four years, it has not changed. Among the obese population an average of 70 percent are women and 30 percent are men,” he said.
Risk factors for obesity identified
“We conduct between 800 and 1,000 bariatric surgeries per year and the number has been the same during the past few years,” he added.
According to Dr Bashah, different reasons like awareness initiatives, medicines and improvements in bariatric surgery have influenced the prevalence of obesity.
However, an increase has been noticed in the prevalence of obesity among adolescents during the past several years.
“Obesity among adolescents is increasing in the last few years, and it has reached almost 20 percent,” said Dr Bashah.
“If childhood and adolescent obesity is not controlled those having the condition risk more chances of developing hypertension, diabetes and cardiovascular diseases later in life. Changing lifestyle is more important than having a bariatric surgery and taking medicine to control obesity,” he added.
The prevalence and nature of obesity in Qatar is similar to other GCC countries but it differs from other parts of the world.
“Obesity in Qatar is similar to other Gulf countries. Kuwait is number one and Qatar is second in prevalence of obesity. But its different from the Western countries because the food and generics are different. I think our obesity is bit tough than what we see in the Western world, because here we are a more closed community and have inter-family marriages,” said Dr Bashah.
“I think premarital assessment is a very good idea to prevent obesity,” he added.
Risk factors for overweight and obesity include poor dietary habits, lack of physical activity, and sedentary lifestyle and some social traditions and practices.
But like many other conditions, obesity is also a result of an interplay between behavior, environment, and genetic factors.
“We do a lot of research on obesity with partners like the anti doping lab, Qatar robotic centre, Qatar University and Weill Cornell Medicine -Qatar. Also the Qatar Genome Program will look into generic reasons behind obesity. All these research will help to find the nature, causes, influence of genes and impact of bariatric surgery on obesity,” he added.
