When Professor Manny Noakes from the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) spearheaded the Total Wellbeing Diet, nearly in decade ago, ABS stats calculated 53 per cent of Australians were classified as either overweight or obese.
Back then, the reasons for developing the diet were simple enough: lifestyle choices were causing many Australians to have a higher risk of getting a preventative disease and with a little help many people could establish a healthier attitude towards food.
It’s no surprise that more than a million copies of the Total Wellbeing Diet books have been sold since its original release.
Australians—like western societies elsewhere in the world—have less time, more convenient and unhealthy fast food outlets on every corner, and are eating with less mindfulness either in front of the TV or computer screen typing at the same time as chomping a sandwich.
Fast forward to 2014, and the levels of Australian’s who are overweight or obese are now more than 63 per cent. Yikes! That’s 14,846,165 people according to the current ABS stats that say our current population is at the about at the 23.5 million mark.
Fail to acknowledge the severity of the issue and it will cost Australian’s more than dollars alone. In 2008, the annual financial cost of obesity was estimated at AUD$8.3 m. What’s more concerning is the affect it’s having on our health and wellbeing. Obesity is now the primary cause of diabetes and cardiovascular disease around the world. And an additional AUD$49.4 billion was lost in the form of lost wellbeing, bringing the combined cost of obesity to AUD$58.2 billion. These figures are staggering.
Reducing the trend isn’t only a personal responsibility. For the last decade, the Australian Government has spent a significant amount (in the hundreds of billions) on health initiatives, and will continue to do so, aiming to reduce the impacts of chronic disease.
Recent CSIRO research reveals that people need more than recipes to assist them with weight loss—they need access to nutritious meal replacement options to help them get quick results, which motivates them to stay with a weight loss program and also the support through personal one-on-one consultations.
That’s why researchers from the CSIRO’s Preventative Health Flagship collaborated with an Australian biotech company, Probiotec, with a track record of creating meal replacement products, to bring to market a unique health and weight loss program that incorporates CSIRO science – Impromy.
Creating a program is one thing, raising people’s awareness that it exists is another.
Media relations takes thinking strategically, creativity and persistence to maximise return on investment.
And when time is of the essence, go for the high-raters.
Here’s what Channel Nine’s A Current Affair (ACA) had to say about the Impromy program to its 1.4 million viewers. In addition, another 300 thousand breakfasters were privy to the news on Channel Seven’s Sunrise too.
Now that’s a good start in anyone’s book.
Talk to us about sending a genuine, social impact message via the media.
Watch coverage on ACA and Sunrise below.
