Iratkozzon fel hírlevelünkre Amikor a fej végig kint van a vízből
Obese young Chinese students play in a swimming pool during a summer camp for overweight children in Zhengzhou city, central China's Henan province, 12 July 2017.
China has the world's highest number of obese children, according to a recent global study which has once again exposed an alarming and growing trend among China's youth. China has about 57 million obese adults, roughly 12% of the country's adult population, according to the study. That's the second-highest number in the world, trailing only the United States, home to 79 million obese adults (and only one-fourth of China's population). But the most troubling victims of China's ongoing obesity epidemic are children. According to the SCMP, Ma Guansheng, a nutrition professor at Peking University, said in a report last year that behavior patterns and environmental factors are to blame for a decline in children's health in China. Fewer children are cycling or walking to school, Ma said, and increased academic pressure means that kids spend more time studying and less time playing outside. Another study last year blamed China's rising childhood obesity rate on an influx of Western junk food. Researchers found this to be at least partially true: eating habits and food sources had more to do with childhood obesity than did wealth. To fight back against this growing epidemic, schools around the country are beginning to encourage healthy behavior, some more effectively than others. Last year, a kindergarten in Shanghai began feeding overweight children a healthier snack of vegetables, while giving underweight children a different snack of eggs, meat and biscuits. The plan quickly became controversial because of the way that it categorized five-year-old kids by their weight.
