Published in March 2009 Australian Longwall Magazine

Overweight and obesity is a significant problem in the mining industry. Data from the National Health Survey 2005 indicates that 76% of miners are overweight. Watson referenced three other independent studies in New South Wales and Western Australia that have 81-88% of mine workers being either overweight or obese.

Of course there are problems with the Body Mass Index often used in such determinations, with fit footballers and athletes routinely hitting the overweight category.

However, Watson has seen plenty of porky miners in his experience which includes work for open cut and underground mines in Queensland’s Bowen Basin and NSW’s Hunter Valley, covering key companies such as Vale, Xstrata Coal, Centennial Coal, BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto Coal Australia.

“A lot of people are critical of BMI, but when we actually look at BMI as a population marker, it is a very good marker, because 90 per cent of the people who have a high BMI also have bigger girths than the healthy girth recommendation,” he said.

“So it’s not that we are carrying big biceps or pecs, it’s that we are carrying big guts.”

Health problems from excess weight are well documented and include increased risks of Type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, high blood pressure, certain cancers, sleep apnoea, osteoarthritis, psychological disorders and social problems.

But in the case of the latter, Watson’s experience from consulting larger miners indicates the workplace culture is rather accepting of overweight colleagues, along with fizzy drinks and fried food.

“You can’t walk in and discriminate against people based on weight and just target them,” Watson laments.

“You can pull some out of the workforce and say you are going to see a dietitian.

“Here’s someone that has a bacon and egg roll and flavoured milk for brekkie, two pies, a can of coke with a packet of chips for lunch, and then a big meal and half a dozen beers for dinner.

“He turns up the next day at the crib room with a salad roll and a bottle of water and everyone goes ‘Bill you fat bastard, you have seen that dietitian’.”

Watson said a healthier cultural change would have colleagues encouraging such a miner to take part in fitness programs such as Healthy Mates, which is run in some mines.

Around 95% of miners Watson consults know what they should do, but the conscious decision of making the health and fitness changes is more difficult.

He used an example of a middle-aged male mine worker who had to see him on the basis of a doctor’s referral.

Sitting down, the miner said: “Well, my cholesterol is up and my wife wants me to lose my gut.”

After Watson asked him what he wanted to do about it, the miner replied: “I don’t give a rat’s arse, I’m doing what I need to do.”

“But the same guy after a heart attack who comes in is a very different man, saying you tell me what to do and I will do it,” Watson said.

“So the circumstances had changed. As I say to any of those guys, if you lose your health you lose everything, you’ve got nothing left.”

When it comes to working, Watson said every extra kilogram of bodyweight puts an additional 4kg of load pressure on the knee, which leads to increased risks of manual handling injury and back injury.

In reducing weight he said it comes down to diet – what comes in – and exercise – the fuel consumed.

On that point Watson said physical activity only factors in for some 20% of a person’s energy balance and 80% is up to diet, meaning it is easier to consume fuel than expend it.

But he added the benefits of exercise go way beyond weight loss and an overweight person who exercises for an hour a day still reduces the risk of diabetes, cardiovascular disease and other health issues, not to mention the immediate energy boost they get from being active.

Looking at longwall mining, he acknowledged it is a lot more difficult to counsel underground workers because of the logistics involved.

Because of the gas risk he cannot take a laptop down and counsel workers as effectively, and bringing the individuals through a health clinic onsite is also more difficult.

He said with longwall workers it would involve more personal sacrifice in time and expense to improve health and fitness, but noted the benefits.

“There is an argument because underground mining is a lot more physical that they are not going to carry as much weight.

“But the data I have comparing underground to open cut is that they are a similar weight but their fitness levels are a little bit better.

“What it comes down to is, yeah, they might be walking a longwall for eight hours a day, but they are over consuming the amount of energy they need and they are maintaining a greater weight.

“If you’re carrying an extra 10 or 20 kilos up and down a longwall, far out, by the end of the day it’s pretty exhausting, not to mention the extra strain on your back and knees and ankles, and the risk of injury and everything that comes along with that.”

Watson is currently finalising a paper for submission to the NSW Minerals Council Occupational Health and Safety Conference in early April.

He plans to highlight work performance and cost-saving benefits from improved health and fitness, identified from studies undertaken in Australia and the United States. He also plans to outline the theoretical basis of weight management, uncover some myths, expose barriers to losing weight and provide real-life strategies to manage the problem.

“Theoretically, weight loss is easy,” Wilson said. “People can manage their weight wherever they would like to, if they make the right choices. However, often the right choice means sacrifice, which is hard. So in the words of Cat Stevens, it is hard, but it is harder to ignore it.”

Now the principal consultant dietitian of Newcastle-based nutrition business Clued on Food, Watson has a PhD in nutrition and dietetics and has also consulted to the Newcastle Knights.