Childhood obesity sweeping West Norfolk
A CHILDHOOD obesity crisis is sweeping across West Norfolk after new evidence revealed one-in-three youngsters are overweight or obese.
The shocking fatness figure is four times more than in other parts of the county.
The groundbreaking study of 12,000 Norfolk schoolchildren reveals Lynn, Downham, Swaffham, Marshland, and rural areas stretching from the Massinghams to Holme and the Burnhams are some of the worst obesity hotspots in the county – beaten only by Yarmouth and Waveney.
It also shows that the highest prevalence of overweight or obese children live within rural, often affluent, areas – shattering assumptions that obesity is normally found in children living in poor urban communities.
The study, led by Norfolk Primary Care Trust with support from the county council, has been hailed as a significant step forward in tackling childhood obesity, enabling local health services to effectively target resources at the right communities.
Jon Cox, who led the project for Norfolk PCT, said: "It is an unexpected result to find that deprivation – for example, low income, poor health and education – is not strongly linked to levels of obese and overweight children.
"People tend to assume that obese children are more likely to come from the deprived areas. We can now disprove this assumption. We now know that in Norfolk children with unhealthy weights are equally likely to come from an affluent or a deprived background."
Last summer, Norfolk PCT measured the heights and weights of more than 85 per cent of children in 344 schools as part of a national initiative, focusing on reception class pupils aged four and five and ten and 11-year-olds in Year Six. The Norfolk study also analysed the findings based upon postcode areas.
It found that between 30 and 36 per cent of pupils in West Norfolk were overweight or obese, compared to between 0 and 20 per cent in healthier areas such as Fakenham, Dereham, and rural parts around Norwich.
Mr Cox said: "From the least healthy to the healthiest areas there is a four-fold increase in the prevalence of overweight and obese children. In rural areas, such as the Norfolk Fens, about one-in-three children are overweight or obese, however, in the area with the lowest prevalence, less than one-in-ten are overweight or obese."
Across Norfolk it also found obesity was more prevalent in Year Six children, with 30.4 per cent being overweight or obese compared to 20.7 per cent of reception class children. However, both figures were still marginally below the average for England of 31.1 per cent and 22.8 per cent.
Norfolk PCT's health improvement specialist, Lucy MacLeod, said the increase of obesity in Year Six pupils showed how children's eating habits change as soon as they enter an environment where they have greater choice over what they eat.
She said main causes of obesity were a lack of exercise and a high-calorie diet with too much fatty food and sugar.
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Weather for King's Lynn
Sunday 27 May 2012
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