The number of obese or overweight children is likely to hit 70 million by 2015, a new report by the World Health Organisation reveals.
The report, released Friday, says that the number of overweight or obese infants and young children aged between 0 to 5 years spiked to 44 million in 2012 globally from 31 million in 1990. In Africa alone the number of these children increased from 4 to 10 million over the same period.
Developing countries have a large number of obese children. The rate of increase has been more than 30 percent higher than that of developed countries.
"Child obesity is one of the major health issue for tomorrow and today," said Peter Gluckman, who co-presides over the Commission on Ending Childhood Obesity, reports Agence France-Presse.
He also pointed out possible obesity risks in the Pacific Islands, the Caribbean and Middle East. Countries in sub-Saharan Africa also are at risk. "Countries like Nigeria, Ghana and so forth. We are seeing the co-existence of malnutrition on one hand and obesity on the other hand. And, we are seeing numbers that are really quite astounding, particularly in the urban environment. Children now are living in environments with the lots of use of cooking oil, of fried foods and so forth. It is changing quite rapidly," he said.
The 15-member commission by WHO was formed to help formulate a plan to fight childhood obesity. At present, the team is working on a report for the WHO at their next annual meeting in Geneva.
Obesity or overweight leads to a number of health issues such as diabetes or cancer, and action now may prevent a heavy burden on health systems in the future, said Gluckman.
"Social scientists, public health specialists, clinical scientists and economists will join together to synthesise the best available evidence into a coherent plan," said a WHO document on the commission's mission.
