November 6, 2025 • 8 mins
Publicly funding weightloss drugs may not be the answer to the country’s obesity problem.
New Zealand has the third highest adult obesity rate in the OECD, with one in three adults classified as obese, and one in ten children.
Associate Minister of Health David Seymour believes publicly funding things like Wegovy would help save money in the long run.
But community leader and Founder of Butterbean Motivation, Dave Letele told Kerre Woodham that we can’t prescribe our way out of this issue.
While he's not against weightloss drugs, he says they don’t change habits, mindsets, and they don’t break cycles for children.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:06):
You're listening to the Kerrywood and Mornings podcast from News Talks.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
He'd be New Zealand has the third highest adult obesity
rate in the OECD, and our rates are increasing. One
in three adult New Zealand is as classified as obese
one in ten children. We've been discussing whether weight loss
drugs like wagov should be publicly funded. David Seymour, the
Associate Minister for Health, has said in the past, well,
(00:30):
if you're going to spend it back to save five,
why wouldn't you. Community leader founder of Butterbean Motivation Dave
Ltally joins me. Now Morena, Dave, what have you going?
Speaker 3 (00:40):
Kerry good?
Speaker 2 (00:41):
Thank you. Now you know about changing people's mindsets. You
have had enormous success working with people that would otherwise
be stuck in the health system.
Speaker 3 (00:54):
Yeah, and you know it really annoys you when I
hear that about David Seymour when he says, you know,
spend a dollar to say five, where you can spend
a dollar with us to save thirteen as per our
Impact Lab report. You know, so I'm not a these
these drugs or the operation, but you know that you
can't prescribe your way out of these problems. You know,
those things don't change your habits, they don't change your mindset.
(01:14):
That don't break cycles for your children. You know, we've
got to We're trying to help an eight year old
out of Auckland who weighs one hundred kilos, you know,
and there's a whole bunch of underlying mental health issues,
and it's the family just don't know what to do.
There's no support and it's just a you know, to
(01:35):
break that cycle, it takes more than a joke.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
See, we get you know, for half of the texts
that I've had in that say, you know, losing mate
is really difficult. It's it's so much more than people understand.
I've got the other half of the text machine is
full of things. So people are weak and pathetic and
making stupid choices. How does an eight year old get
(01:59):
to that kind of unhealthy level? What?
Speaker 3 (02:02):
How? Yeah, there's I mean, there's a lot of under
lying health and mental health issues with the child, with
the family, and it's the mother is a single mother.
And what we have to understand as well is I'm
just sitting here now in the area we work in,
and it is health food desert. It's a fast food swamp,
(02:25):
and all the wrong choices are right there for us.
And it's not people say it's the choices, it's their choice,
these lazy people. Well, the thing is that all these
bad choices are all around us. And if you're working
multiple jobs, you're coming home from work, you're tired. There's
no time now to educate your children how to cook healthy,
how to shop healthy. You get what's fast and convenient.
(02:48):
It's always cramp you know. So we try and educate
people how to make the best choice of what's available
to you, you know. And that's how you can break
these cycles with children, because these days there's no education
being past them. A lot of the times the parents
aren't educated themselves.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
Yeah, and it does. It goes round, and it's true,
like the poorer the neighborhood, the more crap food outlets
you're going to to find there.
Speaker 3 (03:14):
Yeah, it's just I really don't understand what they keep
trying to do. It's a top down approach, you know,
from you know, from the clinicians down. When it's it's
got to be done from the community up. We've got
to look at the root causes of these things. You
can't I just keep saying, you cannot prescribe your way
out of this issue. Six two points something billion, two
(03:35):
point six billion a year they're spending on diabetes, you know,
forty three million they spend on prevention. Yeah, it's that's the.
Speaker 2 (03:43):
Disgrace when it comes to the people you have helped,
do they stick at it? Are they able to completely
reset their attitudes, their minds, their bodies one percent?
Speaker 3 (03:58):
I mean it's it's I mean, even with myself and
you know, you know your own charactor, it's a roller coaster.
This is not a twelve week thing. It's this is
not a gimmick. And I say it for the first
time people walk in the door. If you're after a
gimmick care, you're in the wrong place. This is the
way we live. And when you get knocked down, you've
got to keep getting up and keep going. You know,
we've had people losing one hundred kilos, one hundred and
fifty killers, reversing type two diabetes coming off all of
(04:21):
their medication. But this has to be the new way
of living. It's not just like you know, a quick
twelve week thing.
Speaker 2 (04:29):
We were talking.
Speaker 3 (04:30):
People that are people. There's one guy that was locked
the way in his house for twenty years. Twenty years.
He didn't leave this house to lose an ambulance. Now
he's a mentor with us, helping others in education. You know,
he's like one of our cooks. Yes, it's amazing when.
Speaker 2 (04:44):
It comes to like we were talking about this around
the homeless as well. If you feel you're worthless, you're
not going to put good fuel into your body. If
you think you're a pile of crap because you're fat
and you're useless and you can't look after your kids
and you haven't got a job, it just becomes a
self perpetuating cycle, doesn't it.
Speaker 3 (05:06):
Yeah, And you know, and I was there. That's that's
the reason why our program worst, because you know, people
look at it and that we have the social proof,
we have the evidence that this works. I was there.
I hated my life. I didn't want to I didn't
want to live. You know what made me happy was
eating some some crap food, you know, for that, for
that little bit of time, I felt some relief. But
(05:27):
as soon as I finished that last bite, I felt
worse about myself. You know. Yeah, and that's you know
we've got I visited a guy last year that his
wife reached out to me and he'd given up. He'd
given up that the way I'm on on on a
special bed. He weighed four hundred kilos, you know, and
the health system cannot do anything for him. No, they
(05:47):
make him comfortable till he dies, you know. So that's
what we're trying to you know, we give these last
messages to people. You know, it doesn't matter what you do,
you have, but you have to want to change. Even
if you're on a drug, you have to want to
change because as soon as that drug finished, as soon
as you come off, and that hunger comes straight back.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
Yeah, So working in conjunction with the drugs, would that
be the best way, because sometimes people need to lose weight,
to begin losing weight, if you know what I mean
to begin that Channe yes.
Speaker 3 (06:16):
And it's an option. What worries me is that it's
you know, I've got friends, uh and people that I
know that aren't that they're not very overweight, a little
bit overweight, and now they're just it's the first option. Yeah,
prescribe with goving, you know, And it's just it can't
be the first option. It can be an option, but
if they're going to fund this thing that they better
(06:37):
fund programs like ours as well, to be done in
conjunction with it. Like we've helped people to lose weight
so that they qualify for the gas of bypass. But
while they're doing it, they're surrounded with other people that
are all in the same journey. They're being educated how
to make the better choices so that they can continue
this lifestyle for their kids and for their family that
can pass down this knowledge, you know, And that's how
(06:57):
that's that's how we can have to address this issue.
Speaker 2 (07:01):
Well, we hear about the successes that you've had, and
we've seen them and they're amazing, and they're remarkable and
they're inspirational. How many can't commit to that journey just
haven't got it in them.
Speaker 3 (07:13):
Yeah, I mean there's always a few that come in
through the program, and you know, we run multiple programs
through the year. And like I said, with anything, like
even with addictions, right, we help people with addictions. My
sister's gone through methaddiction. My very good friends have gone
through methea adictions. You can't help them unless they want
to help themselves. I get so many calls and messages
(07:34):
from parents or you know, worried siblings. Please help my brother,
my mum. I can't help them unless it's been contact
in me, you know. So with anything, it's possible to
change with the right support, but only if that person
wants to change.
Speaker 2 (07:48):
Lovely to talk as always. Dave Letelli, community leader and
founder of Better Bean Motivation BBM, which is all encompassing,
totally holistic way of reshaping how you live your life.
And he said, some fantastics with that. Somebody said, who's
one and two in the obesity stakes and the OECD
(08:11):
probably come as no huge surprise to Mexico, United States
than US, then the UK, Latvia, Belgium that surprises me,
and then even more surprising Korea in Japan. See, that's
the prevalence of the fast foods and the processed ultimately,
well not just fast foods, I mean you processed foods.
Speaker 1 (08:31):
For more from Kerry Wood and Mornings, listen live to
news talks that be from nine am weekdays, or follow
the podcast on iHeartRadio.
You're listening to the Kerrywood and Mornings podcast from News Talks.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
He'd be New Zealand has the third highest adult obesity
rate in the OECD, and our rates are increasing. One
in three adult New Zealand is as classified as obese
one in ten children. We've been discussing whether weight loss
drugs like wagov should be publicly funded. David Seymour, the
Associate Minister for Health, has said in the past, well,
(00:30):
if you're going to spend it back to save five,
why wouldn't you. Community leader founder of Butterbean Motivation Dave
Ltally joins me. Now Morena, Dave, what have you going?
Speaker 3 (00:40):
Kerry good?
Speaker 2 (00:41):
Thank you. Now you know about changing people's mindsets. You
have had enormous success working with people that would otherwise
be stuck in the health system.
Speaker 3 (00:54):
Yeah, and you know it really annoys you when I
hear that about David Seymour when he says, you know,
spend a dollar to say five, where you can spend
a dollar with us to save thirteen as per our
Impact Lab report. You know, so I'm not a these
these drugs or the operation, but you know that you
can't prescribe your way out of these problems. You know,
those things don't change your habits, they don't change your mindset.
(01:14):
That don't break cycles for your children. You know, we've
got to We're trying to help an eight year old
out of Auckland who weighs one hundred kilos, you know,
and there's a whole bunch of underlying mental health issues,
and it's the family just don't know what to do.
There's no support and it's just a you know, to
(01:35):
break that cycle, it takes more than a joke.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
See, we get you know, for half of the texts
that I've had in that say, you know, losing mate
is really difficult. It's it's so much more than people understand.
I've got the other half of the text machine is
full of things. So people are weak and pathetic and
making stupid choices. How does an eight year old get
(01:59):
to that kind of unhealthy level? What?
Speaker 3 (02:02):
How? Yeah, there's I mean, there's a lot of under
lying health and mental health issues with the child, with
the family, and it's the mother is a single mother.
And what we have to understand as well is I'm
just sitting here now in the area we work in,
and it is health food desert. It's a fast food swamp,
(02:25):
and all the wrong choices are right there for us.
And it's not people say it's the choices, it's their choice,
these lazy people. Well, the thing is that all these
bad choices are all around us. And if you're working
multiple jobs, you're coming home from work, you're tired. There's
no time now to educate your children how to cook healthy,
how to shop healthy. You get what's fast and convenient.
(02:48):
It's always cramp you know. So we try and educate
people how to make the best choice of what's available
to you, you know. And that's how you can break
these cycles with children, because these days there's no education
being past them. A lot of the times the parents
aren't educated themselves.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
Yeah, and it does. It goes round, and it's true,
like the poorer the neighborhood, the more crap food outlets
you're going to to find there.
Speaker 3 (03:14):
Yeah, it's just I really don't understand what they keep
trying to do. It's a top down approach, you know,
from you know, from the clinicians down. When it's it's
got to be done from the community up. We've got
to look at the root causes of these things. You
can't I just keep saying, you cannot prescribe your way
out of this issue. Six two points something billion, two
(03:35):
point six billion a year they're spending on diabetes, you know,
forty three million they spend on prevention. Yeah, it's that's the.
Speaker 2 (03:43):
Disgrace when it comes to the people you have helped,
do they stick at it? Are they able to completely
reset their attitudes, their minds, their bodies one percent?
Speaker 3 (03:58):
I mean it's it's I mean, even with myself and
you know, you know your own charactor, it's a roller coaster.
This is not a twelve week thing. It's this is
not a gimmick. And I say it for the first
time people walk in the door. If you're after a
gimmick care, you're in the wrong place. This is the
way we live. And when you get knocked down, you've
got to keep getting up and keep going. You know,
we've had people losing one hundred kilos, one hundred and
fifty killers, reversing type two diabetes coming off all of
(04:21):
their medication. But this has to be the new way
of living. It's not just like you know, a quick
twelve week thing.
Speaker 2 (04:29):
We were talking.
Speaker 3 (04:30):
People that are people. There's one guy that was locked
the way in his house for twenty years. Twenty years.
He didn't leave this house to lose an ambulance. Now
he's a mentor with us, helping others in education. You know,
he's like one of our cooks. Yes, it's amazing when.
Speaker 2 (04:44):
It comes to like we were talking about this around
the homeless as well. If you feel you're worthless, you're
not going to put good fuel into your body. If
you think you're a pile of crap because you're fat
and you're useless and you can't look after your kids
and you haven't got a job, it just becomes a
self perpetuating cycle, doesn't it.
Speaker 3 (05:06):
Yeah, And you know, and I was there. That's that's
the reason why our program worst, because you know, people
look at it and that we have the social proof,
we have the evidence that this works. I was there.
I hated my life. I didn't want to I didn't
want to live. You know what made me happy was
eating some some crap food, you know, for that, for
that little bit of time, I felt some relief. But
(05:27):
as soon as I finished that last bite, I felt
worse about myself. You know. Yeah, and that's you know
we've got I visited a guy last year that his
wife reached out to me and he'd given up. He'd
given up that the way I'm on on on a
special bed. He weighed four hundred kilos, you know, and
the health system cannot do anything for him. No, they
(05:47):
make him comfortable till he dies, you know. So that's
what we're trying to you know, we give these last
messages to people. You know, it doesn't matter what you do,
you have, but you have to want to change. Even
if you're on a drug, you have to want to
change because as soon as that drug finished, as soon
as you come off, and that hunger comes straight back.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
Yeah, So working in conjunction with the drugs, would that
be the best way, because sometimes people need to lose weight,
to begin losing weight, if you know what I mean
to begin that Channe yes.
Speaker 3 (06:16):
And it's an option. What worries me is that it's
you know, I've got friends, uh and people that I
know that aren't that they're not very overweight, a little
bit overweight, and now they're just it's the first option. Yeah,
prescribe with goving, you know, And it's just it can't
be the first option. It can be an option, but
if they're going to fund this thing that they better
(06:37):
fund programs like ours as well, to be done in
conjunction with it. Like we've helped people to lose weight
so that they qualify for the gas of bypass. But
while they're doing it, they're surrounded with other people that
are all in the same journey. They're being educated how
to make the better choices so that they can continue
this lifestyle for their kids and for their family that
can pass down this knowledge, you know, And that's how
(06:57):
that's that's how we can have to address this issue.
Speaker 2 (07:01):
Well, we hear about the successes that you've had, and
we've seen them and they're amazing, and they're remarkable and
they're inspirational. How many can't commit to that journey just
haven't got it in them.
Speaker 3 (07:13):
Yeah, I mean there's always a few that come in
through the program, and you know, we run multiple programs
through the year. And like I said, with anything, like
even with addictions, right, we help people with addictions. My
sister's gone through methaddiction. My very good friends have gone
through methea adictions. You can't help them unless they want
to help themselves. I get so many calls and messages
(07:34):
from parents or you know, worried siblings. Please help my brother,
my mum. I can't help them unless it's been contact
in me, you know. So with anything, it's possible to
change with the right support, but only if that person
wants to change.
Speaker 2 (07:48):
Lovely to talk as always. Dave Letelli, community leader and
founder of Better Bean Motivation BBM, which is all encompassing,
totally holistic way of reshaping how you live your life.
And he said, some fantastics with that. Somebody said, who's
one and two in the obesity stakes and the OECD
(08:11):
probably come as no huge surprise to Mexico, United States
than US, then the UK, Latvia, Belgium that surprises me,
and then even more surprising Korea in Japan. See, that's
the prevalence of the fast foods and the processed ultimately,
well not just fast foods, I mean you processed foods.
Speaker 1 (08:31):
For more from Kerry Wood and Mornings, listen live to
news talks that be from nine am weekdays, or follow
the podcast on iHeartRadio.
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