Childhood Obesity

1. Childhood Obesity Simon Howard & Justine Wilkinson

18. Risks of obesity • Obesity increases the risk of • Hypertension • Type II diabetes • Musculoskeletal disease • Stroke • Coronary heart disease • Asthma • Many types of cancer

20. England, 1980

21. England, 1993

22. England, 2013

23. South Tyneside, 2013

24. Average is no longer healthy • 52% of overweight men and 30% of overweight women assess their own weight as “about right” • 77% of parents of overweight children assess their children’s weight as “about right” • Our common understanding of ‘healthy’ has been lost!

25. Excess weight in childrenChildren aged 2-10 and 11-15 years; HSE 1995-2012 Child excess weight: BMI ≥ 85th centile of the UK90 growth reference. 95% confidence intervals are displayed on the chart

26. BMI status of children by ageNational Child Measurement Programme 2012/13

27. Impact of childhood obesity • Childhood obesity increases the risk of type 2 diabetes, asthma, sleep apnoea, musculoskeletal problems, and cardiovascular disease (among many others) • There are also links to psychiatric diagnoses • There is some (limited) evidence to suggest that, on average, children with obesity have poorer educational attainment • Obese children often become obese adults

28. Socioeconomic patterning

31. Hot food takeaways • 1 in 6 meals is now eaten outside the home. • 1 in 3 Britons eats takeaways at least once a week. • 1 in 3 children under the age of three eats at least one takeaway meal per week • 1 in 5 children under the age of three eats takeaways or ready made adult meals every day

32. Hot food takeaways • Sampling study in Gateshead of food from takeaways found: • About two-thirds had more than an adult female’s RDA of saturated fat • About three-quarters had more than 66% of an adult female’s RDA of calories • Imagine the impact of children’s consumption!

33. England value is 86 per 100,000 South Tyneside’s value is 103.9 per 100,000 population

34. Role of Environmental Health • Regulatory role to ensure food safety • Enforcement powers for Food Hygiene and Food Standards through: • Carrying out inspections • sampling • Provide advice • Responding to complaints

35. The Project Understanding the change in businesses from a public health perspective using existing data.

36. Key Findings: Change over time

37. Deprivation and Location of HFTAs Areas with high levels of deprivation tend to have higher rate per population of HFTAs

38. Reception : overweight / obese Area with low density of HFTAs tend to have lower rates of childhood obesity.

39. Year 6: Over weight / obese Areas with high levels of HFTAs tend to have high levels of childhood obesity.

40. So what next.... • Commitment from Planning, Env Health, Health and Wellbeing Board and Public Health • Looking at both regulatory and educative approaches, for example: • Targeted educative approach • Nutritional claims investigations • Planning are reviewing opportunities within Local Plan policies • PH working with schools (HSP)

41. Summary • The proportion of people who are overweight and obese is very large and growing. • We live in an obesogenic environment – the problem is far wider than takeaways alone. • Physical activity, though not mentioned today, has a big role to play. • Obese children often become obese adults. Early intervention can help children and families. • Local authorities are well-placed to intervene.

42. Thank You Justine Wilkinson Environmental Health Officer South Tyneside Council Tel: 0191 4247920 Email: justine.wilkinson@southtyneside.gov.uk Simon Howard Public Health Registrar South Tyneside Council Tel: 0191 4246442 Email: simon.howard@southtyneside.gov.uk