Study confirms obesity begins in childhood
A new study investigating significant risk factors for obesity found that half the kids taking part grew into overweight adults.
The research is from the longrunning Christchurch Health and Development Study, which has studied a group of about 1200 people from birth to age 35.
It found about one-third of the group was now overweight and another fifth was obese.
Otago University Professor John Horwood, the study director, said: ‘‘It is high and that reflects the fact New Zealand is among the world leaders in the obesity epidemic.’’
‘‘We are all pretty fat, or fattish,’’ he said.
Even more startling, only 5 per cent of the parents of these 35-yearolds in the study were obese.
‘‘So in a generation, obesity has increased four-fold,’’ Horwood said.
Risk factors for children becoming fat included being male, born into a single-parent family, having parents with a larger body size and experiencing severe sexual abuse.
Other predictors were having higher infant weight gain, limited or no breastfeeding and lower cognitive ability.
Horwood said individually the risk factors have a relatively modest impact. But jointly they could add up to something substantial.
‘‘If you have three or more risk factors, there is likely to be an associated increased risk of obesity.’’
He said about 5 per cent of the children had experienced severe sexual abuse, which was at the level of attempted or completed sexual penetration.
‘‘I’m not a public health expert in obesity, but my impression is that by and large the evidence for the impact of education and broader campaigns around healthy eating is relatively modest. We might have to find new ways to target at-risk groups to change obesity.’’
While a number of risks such as overweight parents and sex abuse were harder to change, things like promoting breast feeding, monitoring formula use and limiting the early eating of solid foods could help in a strategy.