Children are getting SHORTER as well as fatter, with British boys bottom of the international height league - and experts fear junk food diets may have stunted a generations' growth READ MORE: Overweight kids have lower intelligence, controversial study finds By Shaun Wooller Health Editor For The Daily Mail Published: 19:01 EDT, 18 June 2024 | Updated: 19:01 EDT, 18 June 2024 e-mail View comments British children face a lifetime of poor health as junk food diets have stunted their growth and fuelled a rise in obesity and type-2 diabetes , a damning report warns. The Food Foundation says kids are growing up in an environment that makes feeding them healthily 'an almost impossibly difficult challenge'. It blames the 'aggressive promotion' of food that is high in fat, sugar and salt and 'shocking' levels of poverty that put healthier alternatives out of reach for some families.
Policies to improve nutritional intake have been 'lacklustre and wholly insufficient' to address the severity of the problem, the charity adds. The consequence is the 'disconcerting deterioration' in children's wellbeing, with babies born today expected to enjoy a year less good health than those born a decade ago. Over a million children had their height and weight measured under the National Child Measurement Programme (NCMP).
Nationally, the rate among children in Year 6 stands at over a third, despite having fallen slightly since Covid began Among Year 6 pupils, national obesity fell from 23.4 per ce.
