Children’s waistlines have been expanding in lock step with the amount of time they spend with televisions, computers, smartphones and tablets, European doctors say.
In the past 25 years, obesity rates have climbed rapidly among European children and teens, according to a consensus statement from the European Academy of Paediatrics and the European Childhood Obesity Group published online in Acta Paediatrica.
Roughly one in five kids and teens in Europe are overweight or obese, according to a 2017 World Health Organisation study, the authors note.
Today, 97 per cent of European households have a TV in their home, 72 per cent have a computer, 68 per cent have internet access and 91 per cent have mobile phones, according to the statement.
This has spurred a surge in screen time, contributing to inadequate sleep, worse eating habits and less exercise – all of which can make it easy for children to become overweight, the statement authors argue.
Parents are part of the problem
“Mass media has been shown to have a broad effect on children’s health and can affect them physiologically and have an impact on their sociocultural functioning and psychological well-being,” said senior author of the statement, Adamos Hadjipanayis, a researcher at European University Cyprus in Nicosia and secretary general of the European Academy of Paediatrics.
“There is evidence of a strong link between obesity levels across European countries and childhood media exposure,” Hadjipanayis said by e-mail.
Parents are part of the problem, Hadjipanayis and colleagues argue.
Even as children’s screen time rises, parents demonstrate little awareness about what their children do online or how much time they spend with tablets, smartphones and computers, the statement emphasises.
Food advertising is another problem, because it can convince children to crave and demand more junk food and make them less likely to eat their fruits and veggies, the statement also notes. They also tend to consume a large portion of their daily calories while watching TV, when ads may influence their food choices.
The fix is more vigilance, the authors argue.
“When their TV time goes down, so does their [weight],” said David Hill, chair, American Academy of Paediatrics (AAP) Council on Communications and Media and a researcher at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine in Chapel Hill.
“Food advertising seems to drive this relationship, as opposed to decreased activity. Sleep is also a major concern,” Hill, who was not involved in the statement, said. “Screen media before bedtime interfere with sleep quality and duration, and poor sleep contributes to obesity.”