KUBANG KERIAN, 14 June 2015 - According to a World Health Organisation (WHO) report, worldwide, it is estimated that over 600 million people aged 18 years and older are facing the problem of overweight or obesity that leads to increased risk of cardiovascular disease, especially high blood pressure which has become the fifth leading cause of death in the world.

A senior medical lecturer at Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) School of Health Sciences, Dr Wan Amir Nizam Wan Ahmad based on his research said, obesity has become more common and is a major cause of fatty liver disease and blockage in the blood vessels.

Wan Amir Nizam was one of the 11 paper presenters in the International Healthy Lifestyle Symposium themed 'Innovations in Obesity and Diabetes: Prevention and Control’ who presented his research paper via teleconferencing, held at Universiti Brunei Darussalam.

This symposium gathered healthcare professionals and researchersfrom different countries and served as an important platform to discuss and deliberate on tackling critical issues in obesity prevention and control.

"The studies conducted on rats fed with high-fat diet for 6 weeks showed that there was an increase in the body weight of the rats from 200 grams to 450 grams and with this weight gain, it gave impact on the liver (acute fatty liver disease) that led to hypertension," he said.

This Symposium involved collaboration between Universiti Brunei Darussalam, Chiang Mai University Thailand and Kanagawa University Japan with the aim to stimulate research activities and cooperation among stakeholders and to identify potential training in academic and research fields relevant to prevention and control as well as to introduce innovative approaches towards healthy lifestyle. - Translation: Tan Ewe Hoe/Text & Photos: Mohd Hafiz Yaacob