As we identify reports, planning and other resources each week we often come across several items on one topic. We usually post them in a string ot items during the week that we find them. For example, we found several reports, guidelines, assessment tools, fact sheets and papers related to promoting human rights through schools during the week of September 3-9, 2017. Watch these weekly highlights for other mini-collections on other topics.
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A review of data from the Health Behaviours of School-Age Children (HBSC) surveys between 2002 and 2014 hase been published by the WHO Regional Office. "This report presents the latest trends in obesity, eating behaviours, physical activity and sedentary behaviour from the HBSC study and highlights gender and socioeconomic inequalities across the WHO European Region. Trends have previously been reported separately, but this report brings together for the first time HBSC data on obesity and obesity-related behaviours." The report notes that "Obesity continues to increase in all but a very few countries and regions, with disparities within and between them being marked. Trend data on dietary and physical activity behaviours are more mixed, but show some improvements for some age groups in some countries. Overall, however, the indicators show that adolescents’ dietary behaviours remain far from optimal, with too many sugary products and not enough fruit and vegetables consumed. At the same time, physical activity as part of daily life has been reduced to the bare minimum: adolescents spend most of their time sedentary. This paints a rather bleak picture that requires ambitious policy action." The report shows that some mixed progress has been made in eating habits, physical activity and sedentary time.
Although the HBSC survey reports only on behaviours and there is no mechanism to correlate or track the introduction of healthy school food policies and increases in physical activity time within the school day, we can safely assume that these HBSC data trends have coincided with increased efforts by schools to prevent obesity. Consequently, we need to question if these school-based efforts alone are sufficient to truly make a difference over the long term. A similar analysis of Canadian efforts (McCall, 2013), reported that similar little progress had been made after two decades of obesity prevention and heart healthy programs in that country. In our view, this HBSC report requires us to ask some essential but possibly inconvenient questions:
(This item is among the 5-10 highlights posted for ISHN members each week from the ISHN Member information service. Click on the web link to join this service and to support ISHN) |
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