Broadcast DetailsShow: Special Assignment VIIIEpisode Title: Heavy Weight!
Date: Tuesday, 1 August, 2006
Time: 21h30
Channel: SABC 3
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In South Africa, almost a third of all adult males and more than half of all our women are overweight. Obesity is on the increase and the Heart Foundation says as a nation we are a ticking time bomb of chronic diseases. For overweight people the risk of heart disease shoots up, as it does for strokes, high cholesterol and diabetes.
Colleen weighs more than 170 kg. She suffers from panic attacks and many weight-related problems, like high cholesterol and diabetes. She fears that if she doesn't shed several kilos, she will die and will no longer be able to care for her only child. But she says that losing weight has been the longest and hardest battle she has ever fought.
Obesity also has many psychological implications. Getting employment is often difficult and fitting in is not always easy. Like many overweight people, Colleen suffers from depression and worries constantly about her size. This makes her vulnerable to promises of instant weight loss.
Expensive products and programmes often make extravagant claims which do not always prove to be true. Colleen has tried many of these products and says all too often she loses weight and then quickly puts it on again.
Consumers have a vast choice of diet books, diet pills, and diet mixtures. Advertisements offering quick results appear in magazines, on television and on the internet. With so many options available how does one know which of them work? What are the health hazards and financial implications of these diets?
With obesity in South African increasing by 20% every year, we ask what we are doing wrong. And what can be done to stop what the World Health Organisation is calling a global epidemic?
This investigation is directed by award-winning journalist Mpho Moagi and was filmed by Dudley Saunders.