kids’
fi tness
fi tness outcomes
Are government and the fitness industry working
together effectively to deliver on kids’ fitness?
Ashley Newman and Ruth Bushi report
O
ur fixation on childhood
obesity isn’t surprising given
the government spotlight
on the issue and the media
coverage given to its Change4Life
campaign. Then there’s the constant
stream of research and statistics, which
currently put more than one in five
children in the obese or overweight
categories by the time they reach school
age. The direst of predictions suggests
almost 90 per cent will fall into those
categories by 2050.
The Change4Life campaign is one
of high-visibility education: fi ve-a-day,
portion and fat control, and getting
kids moving. The roadmap is bite-sized
– fi ve-second TV slots around Channel
4’s The Simpsons, for example, where
Change4Life replaced Domino’s Pizza as
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sponsor. Simple messages have proven
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successful and, with more than 400,000
families signing up to make a change The incorporation of fun and
T
O
T
O
T
O
within the fi rst year, so far so good. inclusion are key to the success
.COM.COM.COM
However, is this top-down educational of kids’ fi tness programming
approach effective on its own or, when
it comes to implementation – whether for assessing the reach and effectiveness per cent of children of a normal weight
by families or fi tness facilities – are of programming to combat childhood are unfit, but also that about 20 per cent
benchmarks and measurements also obesity is still a grey area – perhaps for of obese children are fit.”
required to back up the general goals the very reason that government is still There’s already controversy about the
and guidelines being outlined? If so, do focused on obesity rather than on one of accuracy of BMI in assessing children’s
these benchmarks exist, and is there its solutions, namely fi tness
1
. health, yet while other nations such as
any guidance on what the protocols for Canada have been measuring children’s
measurement should be? fatness versus fitness fi tness over the past 30 years, we’ve
The simple answer, at least at this stage, Dr Gavin Sandercock, who led research never done so in the UK. Why has the
would appear to be ‘no’. While there into falling rates of kids’ fitness released at government never prioritised this?
are plenty of guidelines on how much the end of 2009
2
, stresses the importance Sandercock also doubts the government
to exercise and how often, guidelines of such measurements: “We found that 20 is getting the message about children’s
activity levels through to parents – a
“71 PER CENT OF PARENTS THINK THEIR
concern backed by a recent British Heart
Foundation study which states: “While 71
KIDS ARE ACTIVE ENOUGH, BUT ONLY 11
per cent of parents think their children
are active enough, only 11 per cent are
PER CENT DO 60 MINUTES’ ACTIVITY A DAY”
doing the recommended daily 60 minutes
of physical activity.”
3
(see also page 38)
1

Professor Alan Maryon-Davis, president of the Faculty of Public Health,
2
Ten-year secular declines in the cardio-respiratory fi tness of affl uent English
responded to the question last year: “We have been concerned about the children are largely independent of changes in body mass index – G Sandercock,
sedentary lifestyles of children for some time…But the focus on obesity is right C Voss, D McConnell, P Rayner
at the moment because it is more directly linked to chronic conditions such as Arch Dis Child 2010;95:46-47 doi:10.1136/adc.2009.162107
diabetes and heart disease.”
3
G243 Couch Kids – the Nation’s Future Nov 2009, bhf.org.uk/couchkids
february 2010 © cybertrek 2010 Read Health Club Management online 39
healthclubmanagement.co.uk/digital
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