IMPACT ON THE MIND AND BODY

Custom has it in our society that many activities are indecent, unacceptable and even shameful. It is not customary to use a bicycle as a vehicle of leisure or to go to work or for shopping, it is indecent to jog in the morning because our neighbours may think badly of us and it is shameful to do morning exercises in the courtyard. It seems that we all know why but can find absolutely no explanation. We live in the 21st century and although we are used to seeing characters in Western films jog in the mornings, they have not changed our mindset and biased attitude towards a healthy lifestyle. There is a lot to learn. Generally, in our society a teenager is ashamed of not smoking or of refraining from smoking and saying that he wants to lead a healthy lifestyle. While the promotion of a healthy lifestyle in our country has developed in recent years, owing to the opening of a large number of sports complexes in regions of the country, there are still problems in involving a wide range of people of all ages in this process. Thus, smoking, drinking, overeating and taking little physical activity remain the main risks to health in our society. It is even more shameful to move around the city on a bicycle.

Let's talk about health

Soon the world will be marking World Health Day - the day when the World Health Organization was set up on 7 April 1948. Since that day, the WHO has been joined by more than 190 states, including Azerbaijan. Health Day has been marked every year since 1950. It is held to help people understand how important health is to their lives and to decide what needs to be done to improve people's health worldwide. Every year World Health Day is dedicated to global problems facing the health of the planet, and it is organised under different slogans: "In the safety of your blood lies the salvation of many lives", "Activity is a path to longevity", "Pregnancy is a special event in life. Let's make it safe" and "Reject isolation - help people". This is why it is extremely important during this period to discuss not the number and nature of illnesses in Azerbaijan, but ways of avoiding them. The causes of many lie in the lack of a campaign to popularize a healthy lifestyle in the country, not in the desire of people to keep "a healthy mind in a healthy body".

"No-one says that people should be forced to keep to a healthy regime in life. We are talking about the general atmosphere here. If you walk through streets of New York or Paris, you will be literally infected with a desire to jog in the fresh air in the morning."

It is no accident that Member of Parliament and head of the parliamentary commission for social policy, Hadi Racabli, mentioned these cities in his interview with R+. According to the Red Cross Society, France spends 800 million dollars every year in promoting a healthy lifestyle and the USA - 100 million dollars on a 40 year healthy lifestyle programme. "Americans are taught from the cradle to lead a healthy lifestyle. In the USA, you will not see a single school without the full range of sports courses. A friend of mine, who is actually a US citizen, told me that sports is a way of life in their country. Americans of various ages and means allocate special time for physical training in their schedule. I repeat - they allocate special time for sports, they do not just practise sports from time to time. They practise jogging, surfing or climbing every day. You would agree that you only need the desire and time to jog in the morning. As for tennis, golf, underwater fishing and downhill skiing, you obviously need a lot more time. However, unlike a wealthy Azerbaijani family, Americans always have enough money for physical training. It is built into the family's budget, along with money for food, clothes and education."

The fact that the health industry in the USA began developing about 30 years ago has also played an important role. Paradoxical as it may seem, along with improvements in people's financial situation in the United States in the 1970s, there also appeared many problems related to the deterioration of the population's health. People came home from work by car, turned the TV set on, drank beer, ate popcorn and chips and did not move about and, of course, they gained weight. The number of overweight people increased sharply and this concerned not only doctors, but also the American government. A fitness council was set up under the US President, and it included 20 of the most authoritative specialists in this sphere, as well as politicians from various states. The council's task was to popularize a healthy lifestyle and help create a chain of public fitness complexes. In 1983, American Mark Mastrov set up a "24 Hour Fitness" system, the basis of which was affordability, from opening hours to the cost. Currently, various fitness clubs are available in almost every US town. Apart from this development, the number of smokers has fallen sharply in the USA in recent years. A great many institutions, offices, theatres, train stations and airports have been declared no-smoking zones, or smoking is restricted to certain areas. This is the result of an anti-tobacco campaign by the state.

Affordability of sports

According to Hadi Racabli, physical training and sports in Azerbaijan should be affordable and diverse. "We need to establish healthy lifestyle criteria" - to improve the state of health, reduce alcohol and tobacco consumption, increase the quality of education, reduce death rates and improve conditions at home, work and school. "We should adopt the popularization of a healthy lifestyle at legislative level, and it should include the development of a methodological approach to campaigns directed at the introduction of healthy lifestyles. Increasing the level of education in physical training and health also has an important role here. A healthy lifestyle should be promoted constantly by the media, not to mention that it is time for Azerbaijan to adopt the law "On sports for children and youth" which the Azerbaijani parliament examined in April 2008. The state should allocate funds for the popularization of a health lifestyle," says the MP.

Incidentally, it was precisely within the framework of discussions on the draft law "On sports for children and youth" that Deputy Minister of Youth and Sports Ismayil Ismayilov pointed out that there were serious problems with the development of children's sports in Azerbaijan. These problems are related to financial support, the provision of sports facilities and the low level of material-technical provision in sports schools. Among the main problems, the deputy minister also mentioned the isolation of children's sports schools, insufficient involvement of self-sustaining Olympic complexes in children's sports, as well as the shortage of appropriate staff. The deputy minister stressed that without solving these problems, it will be impossible to develop children's sports in Azerbaijan and ensure large-scale involvement. Ismayilov noted the need to adopt the law "On sports for children and youth" since it will have a positive influence on the issues in question. However, almost a year has passed since the draft law was debated, but there is still no progress. Racabli said that work on the draft law is continuing.

"We want to change public attitudes towards this problem. Recently-built schools have gyms with modern heating systems. What is the result? It is believed that the main and almost only criteria to judge the success of a school are the numbers of pupils who enter universities, and the points they gain in entrance exams. No-one thinks about how many teenagers among these students are healthy and how many are ill. And it is impossible to get the information. As a result, sports and physical training have reduced significance in the national education system. This is unacceptable. We want to break this stereotype. High-rise buildings are being constructed on many schools' premises - the number of school playing fields and basic sports facilities is falling rapidly. The Ministry of Education should be closely engaged in all these problems" thinks the MP. He said the reason why there are young people weighing 45 kg and only 1.5 metres tall in the national army is the lack of regular exercise. "This is an alarming situation, so if we think about the gene pool of the nation, we should pay the most serious attention to children's sports. As we know, a healthy body has a healthy mind. It is to be regretted that there are serious shortcomings in the management of children's sports today."

Racabli said that the circle of poverty can be broken only through good education and robust health. "Until now, we have had only a framework law on physical training and sports. This is why we have developed a law on sports for children and youth which should serve to improve the nation's health and protect its gene pool. Incidentally, the task of overcoming poverty and transforming oil capital into human capital, which was outlined by the head of state for Azerbaijan, is met precisely by making an impact on the mind - the development of education, science and culture, and on the body and health - the development of sports and the health system," Racabli said, in conclusion.