Has industrialization helped to cause the obesity epidemic?
Academics from across the University of Sydney will come together with visiting Chinese scholars at an innovative public forum on Thursday 4 August to analyze how increasing urbanization has impacted our society and health.
Urban development and industrialisation are just two of the many factors that contribute to the epidemic of obesity, diabetes and cardiovascular disease, one of the greatest challenges to human health in the 21st century.
The forum has been jointly convened by Shanghai Jiao Tong University and a new cross-disciplinary University of Sydney center that aims to significantly reduce the personal and social burden of these diseases by transforming the way we eat, work and live.
"The causes of these health problems are not just medical," says Professor David Cook, the centre's academic director.
In fact, he says, the problems have their origins in a complex interplay of factors that can be represented as 50 percent lifestyle, 20 percent biological and 20 percent environmental.
"Environment has a large impact on health. This forum is an embodiment of the centre's interest in breaking down disciplinary barriers and finding innovative entry points to this complex problem."
The new center will draw together a diverse community of researchers and academics who have the capability to consider everything from food production to the economics of grocery shopping, the physiology of metabolic disorders, clinical translational research, public policy, health economics, law and regulation, behavioral sciences and cultural studies.
Thursday's forum will feature speakers from architecture, medicine and nutrition, and sociology, and be chaired by Professor John Buchanan, director of the University's Workplace Research Center.
"One of the key insights of international comparative health studies is that the problems of chronic disease rise with economic development," says Professor Buchanan.
"People's basic biology does not change in a half a decade, but the incidence of diabetes, obesity and cardiovascular disease does, and grows as countries industrialize."
Provided by University of Sydney
