KUWAIT: The Ministry of Health has stressed the importance of raising the level of health awareness among members of society regarding healthy lifestyles through awareness programs. This was stated in a speech by the Head of the Internal Medicine Department at the Amiri Hospital Dr Saad Al-Zanki during the celebration of the first (Amiri Day) under the slogan "Nutrition and movement, health and blessing" in Al Shaheed Park under the patronage of the Minister of Health Dr Khaled Al-Saeed and the presence of the hospital director Dr Ali Alanda.

The celebration included a "Waathon" race and many awareness programs as the holy month of Ramadan approaches. Al-Zanki stressed the importance of promoting awareness among community members about healthy lifestyles, achieving nutritional balance and reducing the intake of high-calorie foods during the holy month of Ramadan, especially patients with chronic diseases such as diabetes and blood pressure.

He pointed out that the greatest danger facing our societies today is the pandemic of chronic non-communicable diseases - pointing out that "Kuwaiti society in particular suffers from alarming rates of diabetes and obesity, in addition to other diseases such as high blood pressure, cholesterol, smoking, cirrhosis of the liver and chronic kidney disease."

Treatments of those diseases have strained the state budget and are likely to escalate unless successful and effective solutions are found. For his part, Head of the Diabetes Unit at the Amiri Hospital Dr Abdul-Nabi Al-Attar, told Kuwait News Agency (KUNA) that the event aims to educate the public about the importance of healthy nutrition and exercise.

Doctors and participants in the event provided medical advice to the attendees in order to maintain healthy lives. He stressed that the event created awareness about chronic diseases such as diabetes, pressure, heart and high triglycerides. He pointed out the need to adopt healthy lifestyle by eating healthy balanced food in general and during the holy month and refraining from smoking.

Al-Attar urged replacing the wrong habits that some people follow by consuming sweetened and carbonated drinks when taking breakfast, and replacing it with a healthy meal, low-fat yogurt and drinking water to avoid indigestion and weight gain problems. - KUNA