Warning as children as young as 10 hit 15 stone
SOME ten and 11-year-old Birmingham children weigh more than 15 stones – prompting campaigners to call for junk food adverts to be curbed.
And the number of severely obese children in the city is continuing to grow, figures show.
There were 1,501 Birmingham children in Reception and Year 6 who were classed as severely obese when they were measured for the National Child Measurement Programme (NCMP) in 2017-18.
This was the highest number in a decade – up from 1,431 in 2016-17, and 858 in 2008-09.
The figures included a boy in Year 6 who weighed 15 stones and four pounds, as well as boys who weighed 15 stones and six pounds and 15 stones and one pound.
Across Birmingham, there were 14 children who weighed more than 14 stones in 2017-18, and 18 that
weighed more than 13 stones. One Year 6 girl, who weighed 13 stones and nine pounds, had a recorded BMI of 38.9.
In total there were 958 severely obese children in Year 6 (ages 10 or 11), and 543 in Reception (aged four or five). It means as many as one in 16 children in Year 6 and one in 29 Reception-age children in Birmingham could be severely obese.
The NCMP programme captures the height and weight of over one million children in Reception and Year 6 in schools across the country each year.
Children are recorded as severely overweight if their BMI is in the top 0.4 per cent for their age and gender.
In response to the publication of the overall figures, the Obesity Health Alliance, a coalition of over 40 organisations working together to reduce obesity by influencing Government policy, said: “The everincreasing number of children living with obesity is a clear reflection of the unhealthy wider environment that pushes us towards sugary and fatty food and drinks.
“We need to start with reducing the number of junk food adverts children see with a 9pm watershed, restrictions on junk food promotions in supermarkets and the food industry stepping up efforts to reduce sugar and fat from everyday foods. Every child deserves to grow up healthy and we need strong Government action to make this happen.”
Public Health England is developing Our Family Health, a digital behaviour change service to support healthier lifestyles in children aged 4-7 years, aimed at families with the most to benefit.
Across England, levels of severe obesity in Year 6 children have also reached the highest point since records began, according to Public Health England (PHE).
One in 24 children in Year 6 were severely obese in 2017-18, the highest rate since records began in 2006/07. That was a total of 24,400 children.
The heaviest child included was a boy in Enfield who weighed 16 stones 11 pounds. There were 14,600 children in reception classes in 201718 who were severely obese, down from 14,800 in 2016-17.