10% of the world's children are overweight or obese and the figures are rising

Main Category: Obesity / Weight Loss / Fitness
Also Included In: Pediatrics / Children's Health
Article Date: 13 May 2004 - 0:00 PDT


According to experts, over 155 million kids, or 10% of the world's children, are either obese or overweight. According to Professor Ricardo Uauy, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, Head of Public Health Nutrition, "We need urgent action. The time for action is now." He is the editor of the latest report on childhood obesity and has called for a worldwide strategy to halt the escalating growth in global child obesity.

Uauy said to the Reuters news agency "We are facing an epidemic in children. We thought obesity was a problem for adults -- it is a global problem in children and it is going to get worse before it gets better."

Not only is obesity in children a serious problem in the USA. Rates are rising fast in various parts of the world, such as Europe (especially the UK), the Middle East and the Asia Pacific region.

The new report was published by the International Obesity Task Force (IOTF), London, UK.

In the USA alone 10% of 5-17 year olds are obese while over 30% are overweight.

Southern Europe, once known to have lots of lean people who eat olive oil as their fat base and lots of fruit and vegetables, is experiencing a fast rise in child obesity. 20-35% of kids in Southern Europe are now overweight. The figure for Northern Europe is 10-20%.

Child obesity is not a problem that is just confined to the more economically developed countries. Obesity levels in kids in South Africa are reaching those of the USA.

Uauy said to Reuters "These figures are extremely high, especially figures emerging from developing countries where we thought malnutrition was a problem. Now we are seeing that stunted children become obese as soon as they start getting the regular diet and physical inactivity of other countries."

Uauy called on the WHO (World Health Organisation) to help developing countries to work out and implement strategies to deal with childhood obesity. Factors such as encouraging breast feeding, food education, getting schools to include more physical activity in their curriculum, and better nutritional information on food labels would help.

It seems that the main reasons children are getting fatter are:

-- Lack of physical activity

-- Bad diet

-- Too much time spent on computer/video games and watching TV

He said that in some countries the number of obese children has tripled over the last ten years.

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