DEFENCE FORCE FATTIES screamed the headline of The Daily Telegraph on an ill-fated morning whilst I tried to enjoy my usual weekend breakfast of glee. The online article has the less sensational headline of 'Defence Force Obesity Epidemic', but you get the idea. Apart from the immediate guilt at scoffing down the breakfast of champions (I think it was the vegetarian big breakfast with scrambled eggs, but I can't quite remember), and having recently failed my Physical Fitness Test multiple times, I was taken aback by the image in the paper of 'Hot chicken heroes':
Fortunately, the surname patch on the left side of HCH#1 has been craftily edited out on the online version of the photograph, but nothing seemed to stop the newspaper from printing the unedited version in several hundred copies. The soldier's rank is obscured by the kebab, but due to the Australian flag on the arm of HCH#2, and noting that the caption mentions the photo was taken in Brisbane, it probably wouldn't be able to find out who HCH#1 probably is. Regardless of whether anyone can narrow down the true identify of HCH#1, I'm sure the two know who they are. How embarrassing. Since when was it a crime to grab a kebab? I'd like to think that this article says more about the quality of TDT's journalism than anything particularly conclusive about the state of our troops.
I should say at this point that even though I failed my PFT earlier on this year, I eventually passed on my third attempt, after a couple of weeks of solid training, sound advice and remedial PT classes led by the supportive and encouraging staff at the base gym. I guess that makes me a form of evidence that even though someone in the military can lack the discipline to maintain their fitness during the entirety of the year, it doesn't take that much in effort and resources to get that fitness back. Obviously the situation is different for other people who have more work to do, whether it's due to recovering from injuries, being deployed in areas where it's difficult to maintain physical fitness routines, or because they ate more ham over Christmas than I managed to during my leave. However, I'd like to think that any member of the ADF would also believe that it's possible to achieve the basic fitness level and maintain it without too much difficulty.
The big stink about this article is that is uses BMI as a metric to classify people as 'obese'. A multitude of people (military and civilian, from the looks of it) commented to various incarnations of the online and print articles, pointing out that BMI does not take into account muscle mass or body type/structure when labelling people as obese or otherwise. BMI is useful as a guide, but when you're talking about a subsection of the population that are more likely to contain muscular types, or at least people that have greater than average inclination to do regular weight training (whether it's incidental from pack marching, carrying a weapon/webbing, compulsory PT sessions involving weights work), it becomes less useful.
It's also worth pointing out that Australians in general are becoming bigger/heavier as a population, so the alarmist comment that our troops 'are becoming super-sized, averaging 16kg heavier than their World War I counterparts' is somewhat irrelevant. Never mind the fact that no other statistics are mentioned about how the average size of Australians has changed in the past 100 years, and that the size increase of today's troops compared to WWI could also have something to do with the average age upon enlistment (or even of members in the entire ADF, for that matter).
Some online commenters brought up the point about mess food quality and choices available, and I must admit that after eating at four different military locations (RAAF, Navy as well as Army), there are not always a wide variety of healthy options. However, some choices are always better than others, and policing the food that messes provide to ADF members would be a futile solution to the 'epidemic', considering that most members have the ability to eat food from elsewhere anyway. During recruits, when I was eating three square meals a day, going crazy on weekends with whatever I wanted, and scoffing vending machine snacks and contraband whenever possible, I still managed to lose weight and get fit in a way I never have before. I didn't give much thought to what I ate at the mess, because I was far more concerned about getting as much food into my mouth as possible during the limited time we had during meals. I realise this totally goes against anything that a nutritionist, doctor, dietitian or personal trainer would recommend, but I guess we worked hard enough to work off everything that was put on our plates.
When I had my first Annual Health Assessment, I informed the Medical Officer in a general questionnaire (which I guess is used by them to determine what kind of healthy habits or bad health indications there were to praise/beat out of us with a stick) that I had gained 10kg in approximately 6 months. Yes folks, this isn't a normal or healthy occurrence, and to be honest I didn't realise how drastic the numbers seemed until I compared my weight at the time to my all-time-record from rookies. I put down a little weight gain to having come out of the recruit lifestyle, and a little more to starting cooks' course, which meant a lot more eating than I was used to. What I didn't count on was the influence of Depo injections, which I'd started once I got to Cerberus, and decided to stop after struggling to shake off the weight that I'd gained since finishing recruits.
Despite not knowing for sure whether Depo was to blame for all that weight gain, the MedicO informed me of what resources were available to me to help me lose it once more. I could make specialist appointments with a dietitian in town, to see whether it was a matter of what I was eating that was the problem, or if it could be some weird hormonal thing (Depo, anyone?) or some other kind of body malfunction. I could weigh in weekly in a sort of Weight Watchers manner, so that during my weight loss journey I could be accountable for my progress and also get regular support and advice . I could participate in Physical Conditioning Program classes at the gym (also for people that had trouble passing PFTs), and speak to Physical Training Instructors on what sort of exercise I was doing. I even read some documentation on Defence sponsored diet products and even gastric surgery, which scared me a little. But this all goes to show that ADF does actually care about managing weight/fitness, as opposed to just kicking people out once they don't meet a certain standard/number/metric.
Perhaps it's not even worth my time saying that although 14% of the ADF appears to have a BMI over 30 (myself included, and even at my fittest during rookies I wasn't ever in the healthy weight range), the real concern should either be the ADF's capability to defend the nation despite the size of our respective girths, or the percentage of Australians that have a BMI over 30. I can't help but be biased in saying that the ADF made a wise choice in changing the entry requirements so that people with a BMI over 30 could still enlist, otherwise I never would have made it in when I did, but I am a firm believer that as long as you are physically fit enough to do your job, your BMI should not matter.
