Childhood Obesity Briefing 2024

16 October 2024
New briefing highlights alarming trends in childhood obesity in Scotland, underscoring the urgent need for regulatory action to address the growing health and development crises.

We have published our new compendium briefing on childhood obesity in Scotland. The briefing provides an overview of current childhood obesity data in Scotland, outlines current inequalities in child weight outcomes, highlights key evidence on causes and consequences of childhood obesity, and provides details of current policy in Scotland. 

Highlights: 

  • In 2018, Scotland set a national ambition to halve childhood obesity to 7% by 2030. 
  • Despite this, childhood obesity in Scotland is growing alarmingly, with 18% of children aged 2-15 at risk of obesity in 2022.  
  • The proportion of Primary 1 age children at risk of developing overweight and obesity in academic year 2022/23 was 21.9%. For obesity alone, the proportion of children at risk was 10.5%. 
  • Concerningly, children from the most deprived areas are more than twice as likely to be at risk of obesity compared to those from the least deprived localities (13.9% vs 6.8%).
  • Consumption of sugary soft drinks is more than twice as high among children from the most deprived areas as compared to the least deprived (29.1% vs 13.1%). 

These findings reveal the growing inequalities in child health outcomes across Scotland, indicating a clear correlation between increasing deprivation and unhealthy food consumption. 

To tackle these disparities, Obesity Action Scotland calls for urgent implementation of evidence-based measures: 

  1. Early and comprehensive regulation that comprehensively restricts price and location promotions of food and drink high in fat, salt, and sugar (HFSS). 
  2. Restrictions on advertising of HFSS products, particularly in outdoor spaces. 
  3. Mandatory requirement for healthy children's menus in the Out of Home sector  
  4. Expansion of universal free school meals to all school-age children to help tackle the growing inequalities associated with childhood obesity. 
  5. Utilise the National and Local Good Food Nation Plans to ensure availability of healthy food in communities. 

These measures aim to create a healthier food environment for all children in Scotland, regardless of their socioeconomic background. By addressing the underlying causes of obesity and inequality, we can work towards halving childhood obesity by 2030 and significantly reducing diet-related health inequalities. 

Dr Shoba John, Head of Obesity Action Scotland said:

“All children should be able to grow up in a healthy food environment that helps achieve healthy weight outcomes and ensures food security. Junk food marketing and promotions detract from this pursuit. Policy responses are inadequate and lagging, while obesity among children is at an all-time high since 2011. We need bold and urgent action from policy makers at all levels to deliver the change we need to see.”  

Read our new briefing here

 

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Childhood Obesity Briefing October 2024