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Hidden hunger in Cape discussed at nutrition forum by Kylie O’Brien 30 September 2015
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rowing concerns about nutrition-related disease in Cape York communities will form a key part of the discussion at a meeting on food and nutrition issues this week. While providing incentives to influence consumer food choices in remote supermarkets such as Aurukun’s Island and Cape Store, the cost of living for residents is too high and consequently, unhealthy choices tend to be the easy option for many consumers. Food insecurity and the lack of reporting of important nutrition related health data will form the basis of Apunipima Cape York Health Council Nutrition Team Leader Melinda Hammond’s abstract when she presents Hidden Hunger in Cape York at a forum on Wednesday - Food and Nutrition: The Gap in Health for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. The one-day forum in Sydney will bring national leaders in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander nutrition, policy, governance and research together to discuss areas of policy and practice. Themes include policy and governance, workforce and community, nutrition past and present and the evidence on
Ms Hammond is currently the Nutrition Team Leader at Apunipima Cape York Health Council, Queensland’s largest community-controlled Aboriginal health organisation. She has trained as a dietitian-nutritionist and has spent most of the last 20 years working in preventative health with a particular focus on working with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities in Queensland and Victoria to improve health outcomes. Ms Hammond has also worked in tertiary education and has an appointment as adjunct lecturer in the College of Healthcare Sciences at James Cook University.
strategies to reduce diet inequity. Ms Hammond said while specific nutrition related health data for Cape York still needs to be collated, we have enough information to raise growing concerns about patterns of nutrition-related disease being observed in these remote communities. “Anaemia among infants, young children and their mothers coexists with growing rates of overweight and obesity,” Ms Hammond said. “Undernutrition is ‘hidden’ behind
apparent over-nutrition. “The underlying contributing factors are complex but there is little doubt among Indigenous and non-Indigenous health professionals working in Cape York that food insecurity and the diet of ‘poverty’ is at play.” Ms Hammond’s presentation will share practitioner experiences from the field and a call-for-action on both practical and policy responses to address food insecurity.
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