Dec

22

British children's fitness levels 'falling twice as fast as international average' - Telegraph.co.uk(Childhood Obesity News)

Filed Under Childhood Obesity News | Leave a Comment

Children’s fitness in the UK has declined by eight per cent, compared to an average of only four per cent for the rest of the world. Their study – published in the Archives of Disease in Childhood journal – will fuel concerns about the selling-off of school playing fields under Labour and the health consequences for the so-called “PlayStation generation”. Critics accused the Government of presiding over the decline of school sports and said the recent investment of billions of pounds to encourage them to become more active was clearly not working. The researchers used ‘shuttle runs’ to test the children’s cardiovascular fitness – usually defined as how efficiently the heart, lungs and other parts of the body deliver oxygen to muscle tissue to aid endurance and prolong physical activity. Dr Gavin Sandercock, from the Centre for Sports and Exercise Science at the University of Essex, who carried out the research in an affluent area in Chelmsford, said “less active” lifestyles were to blame for the decline. Read Childhood Obesity

Technorati Tags: , , , , , ,