Croydon seems to be the Scotland of London. You'd be hard pushed to find a deep fried battered mars bar but what we lack in battered chocolate we make up for in fried chicken and pizzas.
As in Croydon number of morbidly obese and overweight Scottish children has risen dramatically in the last ten years, government figures reveal.
the boys did particularly badly. Between 1998 and 2008 the number of overweight boys aged two to 15 rose from 28 to 36 per cent, while the number of morbidly obese boys jumped from 7 to 9 per cent.Jane DeVille-Almond, vice chairman of the National Obesity Forum, said: "The child obesity rate is particularly alarming."
She added that by targeting children, public health officials were failing to address the cause of childhood obesity – overweight parents.
Buying extra-wide beds, wider bedside chairs and wider wheelchairs for increasing numbers of obese patients cost the Scottish NHS £4.4 million in the last five years.
And in 2003 it was estimated that obesity related health problems were costing the Scottish NHS £171 million a year.
Commenting on the figures, public health minister Shona Robison recognised that obesity is an increasing problem in Scotland, posing a serious threat to health.
She said: "Prevention will always be better than cure, and by concentrating on the causes of obesity we stand a better chance of winning the battle.
"Worryingly one in six children are overweight or obese in Scotland and, if unchecked, that will rise to one in four by 2050."
The NHS survey used Body Mass Index (BMI) – a measure of body fat based on height and weight – to calculate obesity.
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