You don't need to count your kid's calories or put your baby on the Atkins diet but doctors are warning parents to watch what they feed their children in light of a new study released Wednesday that says today's babies are fatter than those born 20 years ago.
Researchers at Harvard Medical School say the prevalence of overweight children jumped from 6.3 per cent in 1980 to 10 per cent in 2001.
The study, published in the July issue of Obesity, also found that today's children are 30 per cent more at risk of becoming overweight than they were two decades ago.
Researchers collected data from the visits of more than 120,000 children under the age of six between 1980 and 2001. All of the children were from Massachusetts and enrolled in a health maintenance organization, which provided medical records containing demographic and growth information.
The most shocking results of the study came for the youngest age group studied, infants from birth to six months of age. Over the course of the study, the number of overweight infants increased by 74 per cent. Infants also experienced a 59 per cent jump in the risk of becoming overweight, the biggest increase in any age group.
Children in the study were deemed overweight or at risk of becoming overweight based on U.S. reference data and growth charts at the Centre for Disease Control and Prevention.
Stephanie Atkinson, a pediatrics research scientist at McMaster University, said it's widely known that obesity in children is on the rise. But she said the results of the study might not hold true for Canadian babies.
“The reason I'd be cautious about extrapolating that information here is that we have a lot higher rate of breast feeding in Canada than the U.S. has been able to achieve,” said Dr. Atkinson. “Babies that are breastfed regulate their intake on their own, while babies on formula eat more. Parents kind of encourage them to finish every last drop. So formula babies do gain weight a lot quicker than breastfed babies.”
Dr. Atkinson said studies such as these should be a wake up call to parents to ensure their kids are being receiving the proper nutrition.
“There are some stunning statistics as to the per cent of calories being consumed by children these days,” said Dr. Atkinson.
Previous studies suggest that being overweight as child vastly increases the risk of obesity and other health problems as an adult.
“When you're obese the risk factor goes up for type 2 diabetes, which in turn can increase the risk of cardiovascular disease,” said Dr. Atkinson. “It can all start by being overweight as a kid.”
The authors of the study say mothers should avoid smoking and excessive weight gain during pregnancy and breastfeed their babies to reduce the risk of having overweight infants.
