Children and Obesity seem to be words that are entwined from a very early age. According to official figures, nearly one in four children are obese or overweight when they start primary school and one in three are too fat by the time they leave.
The new data from the government's national children and obesity programme in schools showed there had been no progress since last year in reducing the numbers of overweight children and provoked calls for greater efforts to tackle the obesity epidemic in the young.
National Children and Obesity Forum spokesman Tam Fry said: "We had high hopes that there would have been a marked improvement after all the money that is being thrown at the problem but it seems that more radical measures will be needed to reduce obesity levels."
Lisa Cooney, head of education for the World Cancer Research Fund, said: "These latest figures are a real cause for concern. This is because research has shown that the more overweight a child is, the more likely it is they will be overweight as an adult. This is important for cancer because scientists now say that, after not smoking, maintaining a healthy weight is the most important thing we can do for cancer prevention."
There is no doubt that obesity is one of the biggest public health challenges today. If we do nothing, 90% of today's children could be overweight or obese by 2050, leaving them at risk from serious illnesses such as heart disease or diabetes.
Sir Liam Donaldson, the Chief Medical Officer (UK) has stated that "Encouraging children to use interactive computer games such as the Nintendo Wii will become part of a public health drive to tackle children and obesity".
Researchers found that playing dynamic, interactive games instead of sedentary ones could increase the number of calories burnt by 42 per cent. If children engaged in active play for 60 minutes a day over a year, they would burn approximately 7½lb of body fat.
Whilst this idea is a great attempt at integrating modern computer games with the mission to get our kids to lose weight, it would be much better if we returned to the ways of 30 years ago in our schools where Physical Education was as much a part of the syllabus as anything else - the kids accepted it and it was much easier for the child to continue with active sports in his own time. If we're not careful, we'll encourage couch potatoes!
Author Bio : Peter Abbott
Peter has helped thousands of families tackle the distressing issue of children and
obesity. His website at http://www.children-and-obesity.com
will provide parents with a guaranteed solution to the "single greatest tragedy facing our society today" (Former President Bill Clinton)
