Hundreds of Bermudians have been challenged to change their lives through exercise and healthier eating.

The Live Healthy Bermuda 100-Day Challenge was launched through the combined initiative of the Bermuda Diabetes Association, Lindo's supermarket, Aspen Insurance, the Department of Health and Quaker Oats.

It is the first programme to be started by Live Healthy America, a non-profit organisation based in Iowa, outside of the United States.

Sarah Burrows, of the Bermuda Diabetes Association, hopes the team-based weight loss and physical activity programme will start to tackle Bermuda's obesity problem.

She said: "The 100 days is a period long enough to effect real change in habits. We hope this will reduce the cost on Bermuda's health care.

"We have a good health care system, but don't want to overburden it. In Britain the health care system has already told people with Body Mass Indexes over 30 that they will not offer certain care options.

"We don't want that to happen in Bermuda."

A week ago, in anticipation of the launch today, almost 500 people attended a weigh-in and information session at the Bermuda Underwater Exploration Institute.

Volunteers were overwhelmed by the response as more than 160 people weighed-in and had their Body Mass Index calculated.

Overall, the weight of the 163 people who took part was 32,198.5 pounds and 13,542 pounds of that was purely fat. The average body fat was 40.67 percent and the largest person to weigh-in was 490 pounds.

To participate in the challenge everyone is part of a team, which brings a sense of competitiveness that organisers hope will keep participants motivated.

These teams must be comprised of at least two people, but can have as many as ten. Pages will be set up where participants can enter the minutes they exercised and/or their weight.

All of this information is private, so only the person who puts it in can see their individual weight, however, the main window has the total for the team.

Helping them along the way will be weekly e-mails from Live Healthy Bermuda as well as the nutrition, fitness and motivation resources online.

After the weigh-in on Wednesday, Jane DeVille-Almond, director of the UK's National Obesity Forum, called for Bermudians to join the weight-loss revolution.

She said: "Join the revolution. Take to the streets. In the Island of Bermuda to achieve the targets of what in the UK is two million people, you only need 2,000.

"We've had almost 400 to 500 people here tonight. If each if you goes away and gets four people we have the number."

Terry Faulkenberry from Aspen Insurance explained to those gathered at BUEI how they could participate in the challenge, encouraging everyone to keep up the work.

He said: "Choose change and change your life. But the 100-Day challenge is not about changing it all at once. It is about how you change over time.

"What we are trying to do is to change lifestyles."

Don't worry if you missed the weigh-in and the Wednesday launch. If you would like to join a team or would like more information go to: www.livehealthybermuda.org