Brothers to sing for good heart

Two Samoan opera singers who planned to sing for their mother's surgery bills will now perform for Pacific Island heart awareness instead.

Sani Muliaumaseali'i, a London-based tenor, and his brother Eddie, a bass baritone in Melbourne, came back to New Zealand last month to help care for their mother, Olivia Muliaumaseali'i.

The 64-year-old grandmother, who had previously lived in New Zealand for many years, was unexpectedly diagnosed with heart trouble on a visit from Samoa to Auckland.

As a result she had to have a heart-artery bypass - which costs about $30,000 for overseas residents - at Auckland's Mercy Hospital.

Anxious about the cost, the family hit on the idea of organising a concert to raise the money. Their financial worries ended when the Samoan Government agreed to pay.

But after seeing first-hand the high risk of heart disease faced by Pacific Islanders, the family decided to go ahead with the concert anyway.

They will donate the proceeds to the Heart Foundation's Pacific Islands Heartbeat programme and want to make the event, at St Matthew-in-the-City on Friday, April 7, an opportunity to promote heart-health messages.

Mrs Muliaumaseali'i, mother of nine and grandmother of seven, strongly supports this idea.

"There is education about heart problems, but there should be more."

Her husband, former Samoa Attorney-General Leaupepe Sanerivi Muliaumaseali'i, died of a heart attack five years ago aged 55.

Mrs Muliaumaseali'i said that since her operation she had started walking for exercise and radically changed her diet, avoiding fatty foods like mutton flaps, coconut cream and fish and chips.

"It's a big difference," she said - and so is her weight, dropping to 94kg, from 110kg.

She is keen to keep her health problems at bay. "I want to see my grandchildren grow up."

Heart disease and stroke are big killers in New Zealand, accounting for nearly 40 per cent of deaths.

Pacific Islands Heartbeat manager Iutita Rusk said cardiovascular disease rates were higher for Pacific Islanders than Pakeha.

Among Islanders, nearly half of women and more than 20 per cent of children are obese - rates far higher than for the whole New Zealand population.

The Heartbeat programme promotes healthy eating and activity and has commissioned research on corned brisket preserved in brine - a fatty cut popular with some Islanders - to find healthier substitutes.