In 2023 the Chief Executive of the British Heart Foundation warned the Government not to put the brakes on its anti-obesity policies, adding that the resulting heart and circulatory disease would cost the economy £58m per year. Charmaine Griffiths said that after a flurry of early activity, a ‘bold strategy’ to address obesity was now…
Tag: Diet
Breaking the cycle – how active travel to school could help tackle childhood obesity and inequality
There are a host of reasons, many of them highly publicised in recent years, as to why we should encourage young people to be more physically active. Now a team of London researchers has shown how the time spent travelling to and from school is important in helping children, particularly those from more disadvantaged backgrounds,…
Do sexual minority teenagers have greater health risks?
People who identify as gay or bisexual have long been known to be more likely than others to be at risk from behaviour which can affect their health, such as drug-taking, drinking and not doing enough exercise. But how does this affect today’s teenagers? In an era of greater social liberalism might these differences be…
Wheezing: Can breastfeeding for longer make a difference?
Public health bodies put a lot of effort into encouraging mothers to breastfeed, and for good reasons. Successive studies have shown breastfeeding has a range of health benefits, including a lower risk of wheezing illnesses, which can be linked to asthma. But which of these illnesses are most likely to respond? Is a breastfed child…
Off the scales: time to act on childhood obesity
By 2050, it is said that obesity could cost the NHS almost £10 billion a year, with the full economic cost rising from around £27 billion today to £50 billion by then. Today, the Centre for Social Justice (CSJ) publishes its report, Off the scales: time to act on childhood obesity. It calls on the…
An equal start: longitudinal evidence to support children’s healthy development
Using longitudinal evidence to support children’s healthy development and give them an equal start in life is the subject of our editor Yvonne Kelly’s keynote address at the Growing up in Ireland Annual Conference in Dublin today. Her talk discusses findings from the most recent of the British ‘birth ‘ cohort studies – the Millennium…
Don’t let the kids get jet-lag: why regular bedtimes are key to a happy healthy childhood
The very best of sleep medicine and research is being presented at the World Sleep Congress in Prague this week. Among that research are findings from work by Child of our Time Editor, Professor Yvonne Kelly and colleagues at the ESRC International Centre for Lifecourse Studies. They have been trying to find out what it…
Screen use at seven: overweight at 11. Why it’s time to say no to a TV in the bedroom for children
Since the launch of the Childhood Obesity Strategy in 2016, there has been much attention focused on the so-called ‘Sugar Tax’. The March 2017 Budget saw confirmation that sugary soft drinks would be taxed in an attempt to combat rising levels of obesity. This is an important move that has been met with widespread approval…
Tackling the childhood obesity epidemic: Can regular bedtimes help?
Nearly one in five 10 and 11-year-olds in England is obese, according to NHS figures. With childhood obesity posing not just a nationwide, but a worldwide health threat, public health researchers around the globe are striving to establish which aspects of a young child’s life might set them on a path to being obese later…
Giving children the best possible start – what matters most?
Child of our Time Editor Yvonne Kelly spoke to a 500-strong audience of politicians and professionals in Gothenburg recently on what matters when it comes to giving children the best possible start in life. Yvonne was the keynote speaker at the conference hoping to identify the best strategies for making Gothenburg a more equal and socially sustainable city. Yvonne,…