Melis­sa Doughty

Shiv­onne Har­ris has bat­tled with her 17-year-old son's obe­si­ty for most of his life. He was con­sid­ered mor­bid­ly obese. He was not fed fried chick­en or ice cream every day, but he loved foods such as flour, rice and pas­ta. She has done all she can to get him to be healthy, even en­rolling him in­to two weight-loss pro­grammes. Al­though he weighs less than he orig­i­nal­ly did, he is still over­weight. Har­ris' fight is not an un­com­mon one. In fact, many of to­day's par­ents are bat­tling with the is­sue of obe­si­ty. The sta­tis­tics are trou­bling. Speak­ing at a func­tion on Mon­day, Health Min­is­ter Dr Fuad Khan said more than 25 per cent of school-aged chil­dren five to 18-years-old are obese. More than 55.5 per cent of those 15 and old­er are over­weight or obese, and chron­ic non-com­mu­ni­ca­ble dis­eases are be­com­ing preva­lent among chil­dren and young peo­ple. He said the in­crease in obe­si­ty was the re­sult of poor eat­ing habits.

"The chil­dren see ads on tele­vi­sion pro­mot­ing these types of food and they in­di­cate to par­ents what they want. The par­ents, who are work­ing or un­der pres­sure, give it to them as a treat." *Ro­ry Mitchell's nine-year-old daugh­ter is not the world's biggest fan of veg­eta­bles. He be­lieves that she should eat the things that make her hap­py. "She does not like healthy food but we've stopped her from eat­ing the snacks. She does not eat healthy 100 per cent of the time but we do our best," he said. But Khan be­lieves there are many op­tions avail­able to par­ents like Mitchell. "A par­ent should give a child oats in the morn­ing. It is fill­ing and healthy for the child. Par­ents can al­so grow greens at home. Peo­ple are mak­ing ex­cus­es and say­ing they are work­ing, but it on­ly takes an hour and it is very ther­a­peu­tic," he said in a tele­phone in­ter­view with the T&T Guardian. But even though a par­ent may pro­vide the child with the nec­es­sary healthy meals, as An­ge­line Bel­grove* does for her 14-year-old daugh­ter, Joselle, the child may not eat them. "I don't like to eat veg­eta­bles. But she makes me eat it. I like eat­ing junk food in­stead. It tastes bet­ter than healthy foods," Joselle said.

The Min­istry's fight against child obe­si­ty will in­volve work­ing with fast-food com­pa­nies to have more veg­eta­bles on their menu and to de­crease salt in the foods they sell. Veg­eta­bles are an in­te­gral part of a bal­anced di­et and ad­di­tion­al salt, which in­creas­es the blood pres­sure, places strain on the heart, ar­ter­ies, kid­neys and brain which leads to strokes, de­men­tia and kid­ney dis­ease. "Burg­er King has worked with us along these lines, and they now have more sal­ads and wa­ter on their menu. "They have al­so been plac­ing the calo­rie con­tent on each item," the min­is­ter said. Healthy foods as he­roes will al­so be part of the min­istry's at­tempt to com­bat child obe­si­ty. "The min­istry is de­vel­op­ing car­toons and videos where healthy foods are he­roes and bad foods are the vil­lains. Fred­dy French Fries will be the vil­lains," Khan dis­closed. (* not their re­al names)

Child­hood over­weight and obe­si­ty on the rise

Child­hood obe­si­ty is one of the most se­ri­ous pub­lic health chal­lenges of the 21st cen­tu­ry. The prob­lem is glob­al and is steadi­ly af­fect­ing many low- and mid­dle-in­come coun­tries, par­tic­u­lar­ly in ur­ban set­tings. The preva­lence has in­creased at an alarm­ing rate. Glob­al­ly, in 2010, the num­ber of over­weight chil­dren un­der the age of five, is es­ti­mat­ed to be more than 42 mil­lion. Close to 35 mil­lion of these are liv­ing in de­vel­op­ing coun­tries. Over­weight and obese chil­dren are like­ly to stay obese in­to adult­hood and more like­ly to de­vel­op non­com­mu­ni­ca­ble dis­eases like di­a­betes and car­dio­vas­cu­lar dis­eases at a younger age. Over­weight and obe­si­ty, as well as their re­lat­ed dis­eases, are large­ly pre­ventable. Pre­ven­tion of child­hood obe­si­ty there­fore needs high pri­or­i­ty. What is over­weight and obe­si­ty? Over­weight and obe­si­ty are de­fined as ''ab­nor­mal or ex­ces­sive fat ac­cu­mu­la­tion that presents a risk to health''. Why does child­hood over­weight and obe­si­ty mat­ter? Con­se­quences of an un­healthy lifestyle dur­ing child­hood. Child­hood obe­si­ty is as­so­ci­at­ed with a high­er chance of pre­ma­ture death and dis­abil­i­ty in adult­hood. Over­weight and obese chil­dren are more like­ly to stay obese in­to adult­hood and to de­vel­op non­com­mu­ni­ca­ble dis­eases (NCDs) like di­a­betes and car­dio­vas­cu­lar dis­eases at a younger age.

Tak­en from World Health Or­ga­ni­za­tion