Canadian Inuit not immune to the risk of obesity

WINNIPEG, Manitoba- the evolution of climate and a more stable lifestyle have removed any protection of the Canada Inuit once may have had diabetes, according to a report published Monday in the Canadian Medical Association Journal.

Researchers have long believed that the Inuit, the indigenous peoples of the northern regions of the Canada, Alaska and Greenland, have been largely immune to obesity health risks, because cases of diabetes were rare.

But the newspaper article, written by researchers at two Canadian universities, concluded that the Inuit in the Canadian North had diabetes at similar levels to the rest of the Canadian population.

"Stories (that) the Inuit are protected against diabetes go way back in time and especially the 1970s," said lead author Grace Egeland, McGill University in Montreal, in an interview with the Norway.

"With Westernization and rapid changes in the Arctic, we see that they fundamentally the same risk as Canadian generals."

The melting of polar ice has made it more difficult for the Inuit to hunt for food over long distances. At the same time, they are more and more to settle in permanent communities and taking less active, paying jobs, Egeland said.

The passage of a lifestyle based on hunting caused many Inuit move from a traditional diet heavy on fish or caribou to store-bought food, rich in fats and sugars, and the increased consumption of alcoholEgeland said.

These lifestyle changes add the circumference of the size of a person and increased levels of a type of fat called triglycerides, which are markers of diabetes.

"The changes have been deep enough at several levels," said Egeland.

Type 2 diabetes, the main type of disease, occurs when the body is not actually use or produce enough insulin, a hormone that controls the amount of glucose in the blood.

Researchers at McGill and the University of Toronto used data from a study of 2007-2008 of nearly $ 2 600 Inuit of the Canada.

Their work found that 1.9% of those under the age of 50 had diabetes while 12.2 per cent of people 50 years and plu had the disease. These rates are similar, but slightly lower than the rest of the Canadian population.

The article reported that 35% of the Inuit were obese, in line with the rest of the population.

The report focused on the Inuit of Canada, but rates of diabetes among the Inuit in Alaska and Greenland are also increasing, Egeland said.

A worsening of health in the North because of obesity is likely to drive the costs of health care, Egeland added, with most of the Inuit living far from major cities of the Canada.