Obesity in Spain is becoming a serious health problem, particularly among children. According to the Ministry of Health and Consumer Affairs, in the last two decades obesity in children between 6 and 12 has increased from 5% up to 16%. Changes in social habits, work, and lifestyle in Spanish society have altered eating habits and have increased sedentarism in children.
Regarding these figures, Miguel Mariscal Arcas, researcher of the Department of Nutrition and Bromatology of the Universidad de Granada, analyses in his doctoral thesis the relationship between exercise and food, taking into account body composition of children and adolescents. He concludes that it is necessary to fight against sedentarism in this population.
Mariscal starts with the current situation in this group, for which many publications have estimated a high rate of obesity and sedentarism. Then, he raises questions to be answered in the research. “The child and adolescent population in Spain today has easy access to fat-rich foods and practises unhealthy eating habits”, the research has declared. “And if we add to this the current sedentary lifestyle, the result is a risk of becoming overweight and obese, including all the problems that can affect the child growth and later, as adults.”
Therefore, it is a priority to analyse how we determine our lifestyle, such as exercise and food, because lifestyle may affect the normal body composition in children and adolescents.
Research in Granada
The objective of the research by Mariscal is to determine whether food and exercise are factors that modulate balances in the child and adolescent body, through an assessment of the frequency of food intake, anthropometric and body-composition parameters, as well as their relation to physical condition and lifestyle.
A total of 288 subjects participated in the study, all between 6 and 18 years of age and all from the city and province of Granada. Also, 88 were professional athletes who used to train at the ski resort of Sierra Nevada (Granada), and the rest of the sample (200 subjects) pertained to different schools in Granada.
On finishing his study, Mariscal stated that his nutritional assessment of this group did not establish differences between subjects designated by the World Health Organisation (OMS) as “sedentary and active subjects.” However, the real level of exercise and physical condition is useful as a factor modulating balances in the body in the population.
In this way, his research has shown that regular exercise is important for child and adolescent growth as well as for the treatment of overweight and obesity. According to Mariscal, “it is necessary to have a healthy diet and to fight against sedentarism in this population.”
Recent studies indicate that 1 out of 2 Spanish adults is overweight and around 14% are obese. More cases of obesity signify an increase in dysfunctions associated with weight, such as cardiovascular diseases and some cancers. Besides health problems caused by overweight and obesity, illnesses related to them involve many expenses. In developed countries, it is estimated that direct costs of these diseases reach some 7% of the total health costs. In Spain these losses represent €3000 million per year.
Reference
Miguel Mariscal Arcas, Department of Nutrition and Bromatology of the Universidad de Granada.
Tlfs. +34 958 243 863 Mobile: +34600 726 260. Email: mariscal@ugr.es