Expert predicts escalation of major diseases

HARD HIT: Professor Martin McKee said Northland was more impacted than other regions of the country. PHOTO/JOHN STONE

A world-renowned professor from the United Kingdom says the rise of conditions such as diabetes and arthritis are one of the biggest challenges facing health care in Northland.

Professor Martin McKee was at Northland District Health Board last week as part of a week-long visit to New Zealand.

In a presentation to health professionals at Whangarei Hospital he said chronic diseases were increasingly becoming a burden on health care systems around the world.

"An important issue for a DHB like here is that, because of the deprivation, not only do you have more people with chronic disease, you have more people with more chronic diseases."

Chronic diseases are conditions such as heart diseases, diabetes, arthritis and cancers such as breast and colon cancer. They tend to develop over time and become more common with age.

Northland was more impacted than other regions because most chronic diseases are a culmination of factors with many linked to social deprivation.

"You just need to congratulate yourselves because it is going to be more difficult for you than it will be for other parts of the country," he said.

Dr McKee used examples of how countries in Europe were responding to the increasing burden.

However, he cautioned that just because something was working elsewhere did not necessarily mean it would work here.

Most countries did not spend enough on healthcare, Dr McKee said. What they did spend it on tended to be more on acute care than on chronic diseases.

Northland DHB chief executive Nick Chamberlain said the region had "quite different challenges" to the rest of the country.

Dr McKee, a professor at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, has published more than 820 academic papers and 44 books.