Explosion in childhood obesity in China ‘worst ever’, expert says of new study findings
29-year study finds childhood obesity up 17-fold among boys and 11-fold among girls in rural Shandong; Western lifestyle blamed as doctor calls for ‘catastrophe committee’ to stem rise
Thirty years ago, for every 100 children and adolescents you came across in China, you’d be hard pressed to find even one who was obese. That situation has drastically changed: in 2014, about one in six boys and one in 11 girls were obese, a new study shows.
Researchers say China is paying the price of adopting a Western lifestyle and the findings are a wake-up call for Chinese policymakers to take steps to stem the trend. The 29-year study, published on April 26 in the European Journal of Preventive Cardiology, involved nearly 28,000 rural students from Shandong province.
“This is extremely worrying,” says Professor Joep Perk, cardiovascular prevention spokesman for the European Society of Cardiology. “It is the worst explosion of childhood and adolescent obesity that I have ever seen. The study is large and well run, and cannot be ignored. China is set for an escalation of cardiovascular disease and diabetes, and the popularity of the Western lifestyle will cost lives.”
China is a large agricultural country and our findings have huge implications for the entire nation
Dr Zhang Yingxiu, leader of the investigation team at the Shandong Centre for Disease Control and Prevention, Shandong University Institute of Preventive Medicine in Jinan, Shandong, says: “China is a large agricultural country and our findings have huge implications for the entire nation. The rises in overweight and obesity coincide with increasing incomes in rural households and we expect this trend to continue in the coming decades in Shandong province and other regions of China.”