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Search forExercise won't cut childhood obesity
07:00 - 30-June-2008
Ten-year-old guidelines, which recommend children need an hour's moderate physical activity a day, are dated and need to be revised, according to researchers at Peninsula Medical School in Plymouth.
The Earlybird study, examining a group of 307 children, from the ages of five to 16, has already provided evidence exercise plays little role in a child's weight (or body mass index).
Professor Terry Wilkin, director of the study, said there were two important findings from the first three years of the study.
He said: “First, the weight measure that people use, the body mass index, doesn't pick up any difference for those children who do and don't meet physical activity guidelines. It's a very rough index and a very blunt tool.
“Second, if you look at the blood samples of the children, you can see those who do more exercise benefit metabolically than those who don't.”
The results of the study, published today in Archives of Disease in Childhood, show less than half of boys and only one in eight girls manage the recommended weekly amounts.
The researchers base their findings on the long term monitoring of 113 boys and 99 girls from 54 different schools, all of whom were five years old when the study started in 2001.
The children's weekly physical activity levels were measured using a tiny device worn around the waist and designed for the purpose.
Changes in weight and predictive health indicators, such as insulin resistance, blood fat and cholesterol levels, and blood pressure were measured annually between the ages of five and eight.
Taken together, these health indicators reflect the risk of developing cardiovascular disease and diabetes.
Both the UK and US guidelines recommend children are moderately physically active for at least an hour every day, in a bid to stave off obesity and its attendant health risks. And they measure body mass index (weight) to monitor impact
The results showed there was a wide range of physical activity among children, some spending as little as ten minutes a day at the recommended intensity while others were spending more than 90 minutes a day. Around 42 per cent of boys, but only 11 per cent of girls, met the 60-minute guideline.
The authors suggest the measure used to gauge impact may simply be too crude, and applying the same guideline to both sexes may not be appropriate.
Prof Wilkin added: “Children who do more exercise benefit, but we still have no idea how to encourage those who do not meet the deadline to do more.”
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