Anorexia may be on rise among children

Anorexia among children and young people could be on the increase, data suggests.

A study found a doubling in the number of eight to 12-yearolds suffering from the condition, when compared with previous estimates.

Anorexia is a serious eating disorder and mental health condition.

It mostly affects girls and young women and leads to people keeping their weight as low as possible by not eating or exercising to excess. Sufferers also often think they are fat when they are dangerously underweight.

For the new study, published in the journal BMJ Open, researchers, including from the Institute of Psychiatry in London and Imperial College London, examined data from the Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Surveillance System.

The data showed there were 305 separate cases of anorexia among children and young people aged eight to 17 over an eight-month period in 2015. Most of the sufferers – 91 per cent – were female.

Overall there were estimated to be 14 cases of anorexia per 100,000 children aged eight to 17 in the British Isles.

Broken down by gender, this amounted to 26 cases per 100,000 young women and two per 100,000 young men.

Incidence rates of anorexia increased steadily with age, the research found, peaking at age 15 for girls and age 16 for boys.

Comparison with other studies is difficult because some are based on estimates of children seeing their GP for anorexia, while others focus on children under hospital care.

The authors were able to accurately compare data for children aged eight to 12. For this age group, previous research in 2016 found 1.5 cases per 100,000 children.

But in the new study this figure jumped to 3.2 per 100,000, “suggesting that incidence rates for younger children have increased over time”, the researchers said.

They added: “Future research should explore the development of earlier interventions, given evidence of an increase in incidence in young children, suggesting that onset of anorexia nervosa may be starting earlier for some young people than suggested by previous research.”

Tom Quinn, director of external affairs at the eating disorders charity Beat, said: “We know from our research and listening to the experiences of our supporters that it can often take a long while for early signs of an eating disorder to be spotted, for a referral to be made and for the treatment to begin.

“Therefore, while this rise in the number of young children being diagnosed with anorexia could mean that the condition is developing at an earlier age than in the past, it could also be due to improvement in the ability of healthcare professionals to identify children with anorexia.”