60 minutes exercise daily reduces risk of overweight, obesity in children

Dr. Seyram Kaali, A clinical research fellow at the Kintampo Health Research Centre, says children must be involved in physical activity for at least 60 minutes a day to enable them to expend the calories they consume.

He told the Ghana News Agency that more play time would help burn calories to reduce overweight and obesity.

He said childhood obesity, which used to be a menace in high-income countries had now become a global pandemic with more children in low- and middle-income countries becoming overweight and obese.

Dr Kaali said the frequent consumption of processed canned foods and beverages high in sugar and salt with low nutritional value and a lack of physical activity among children were the major causes of overweight and obesity in Ghana.

“Obesity and overweight generally occur when an individual eats an unbalanced diet with more calories and does not engage in exercises to expend the calories,” he said.

The World Health Organization says overweight and obesity are a growing threat to children’s well-being globally, largely driven by a trap of unhealthy and highly processed foods combined with a lack of physical activity and sedentary behavior.

It said almost 40 million under-fives around the world are overweight or obese and these are conditions that can lead to a lifetime of diseases, including some of the world’s biggest killers such as cancer, diabetes, and heart disease.

Dr Kaali stressed the need for Physical Education (PE) to be revived and made compulsory in schools.

He called for a food policy that would help to determine standards of the nutritional content of processed foods and canned beverages imported into the country.

He said parents must be interested in the Body Mass Index (BMI) of their children, monitor their weight, and reduce fatty food in a child’s diet to protect them from future health problems.

Dr Kaali advised parents to also increase the portions of fruits and vegetables in every diet to ensure that children drink more water and eat less calorie-dense foods.

“Poor planning of urban centres, the lack of playgrounds, play parks, and even the way streets are designed to make it uneasy for people to engage in physical activities and it is time to think health when planning in all sectors,” he said.

He said being overweight and obese in childhood was associated with an increased risk of diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, metabolic diseases, and cancers in adulthood.

“How a child is fed in the first year of life may contribute to obesity in later years, if not done right, I would like to encourage new mothers to breastfeed their children exclusively in the first six months of their life and be mindful of the types of foods used to feed them.”

Dr. Kaali said childhood overweight and obesity were associated with a mirage of health conditions and that the national health systems may have to spend more to cure it if not prevented now.

“At the country level, Ghana needs to have policies that encourage people to adopt healthy lifestyles, we should make healthy foods available and affordable to people,” he said.