A campaign, backed by National Lottery cash, reaches the Bradford area tonight to highlight the causes of a disease which every year leads to 15,000 premature deaths across the country.

Leading experts from across the North will be at a free public meeting in Brighouse to discuss osteoporosis and methods to prevent the condition, which leads to fragile bones in one in three women and one in 12 men over the age of 50 in the region.

The illness results from a reduction in bone density as people get older, leading to painful and, sometimes, severely disabling fractures, and costs the NHS more than £940 million annually.

Linda Edwards, director of the National Osteoporosis Society, said many people had heard of the condition but did not know their own risk and how to prevent it.

"We hope to inform and encourage people that it is never too early or too late to protect your bones from osteoporosis," she said.

"The campaign will provide people with an excellent opportunity to learn how to protect themselves and their families and friends from painful fractures in the future."

Frances Armes, clinical scientist in the medical physics department at Bradford Royal Infirmary, which every year carries out scans on a thousand people for the disease, said the numbers of people affected were growing as the population aged.

A type of x-ray is taken to gauge the extent of the illness to examine bone density in the spine and femur in the leg which are the bones which give the most problems in osteoporosis, leading to curvature of the spine, broken vertebrae or hip fractures.

It is a particular problem for people from their late fifties but some developed it earlier.

It is more likely to develop in women who have an early menopause but it is also linked to lack of exercise and poor diet affecting the level of minerals in bones.

Those whose diets are restricted because they are anorexic or sports people can develop it before the age of 30 and people on steroid treatments are also at risk.

"We all lose bone after a certain age, about 50, so we are all at risk," she said. "It is important people are aware of the risk factors. For someone who is elderly, prevention is always better than cure - if you have lost a great deal of bone you can't get it replaced.

"In terms of preventing it, we can take care of our exercise and our diet, but people who are more severely affected are recommended to take drug treatments."

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