Poor Food Habits Raise Fat Cebuano Kids

CEBU, Philippines - Bad eating habits are eating into our infants and young children. Poor food habits and improper nutrition are raising fat kids in Region 7. Use of infant formulas, instead of breastfeeding, has been blamed as the heaviest reason for obesity among infants, especially Cebuano babies.

Looking into files from the National Nutrition Council 7, nutritional statistics show that during the Operation Timbang in 2011, one out of seven children suffering with improper nutrition is overweight. An improperly nourished child is either overweight or underweight. It was found that during the Operation Timbang done from January to March of 2011 among infants and children of ages 0 to 71 months, there were 4,373 overweight children out of the 294, 210 Cebuano children weighed. Take note, there were more overweight children in Cebu than in Bohol, Negros Oriental and Siquijor. Fat chance, Cebuano babies and children are vulnerable to cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, cancer and other non-communicable diseases. The infant is also prone to convulsion. If you see a fat baby or holding on to a fat toddler while reading this story, fat chance that’s exactly what I’m writing about.

NNC 7 Nutrition Program Coordinator Dr. Parolita Mission and her Nutrition Officers Susan Y. Orpilla and Nasudi G. Soluta all said bottle feeding or infant formula feeding is the biggest culprit. All three gave the same answers despite being interviewed separately. Soluta said that infant formulas contain carbohydrates and sugars that make it difficult of baby tummies to digest. Hence infants tend to have “baby cholesterol.” While baby fat can be shed off with exercise over time, indulgent and sedentary lifestyles among children who now stay on computers and tablets instead of playing under the sun, the rain or climb mango trees can harden those baby fats into bad cholesterol when they become teenagers and then adults.

Orpilla deplored that adults tend to contaminate and transfer their indulgent eating habits in managing the diet of their children and babies. Mothers and caregivers who bottle feed their babies tend to give-in to an infant demanding for food. “Little do mothers know that this giving-in is doing the infant more harm than happiness,” said Orpilla. “There is a psychological and emotional effect of breastfeeding that infant formulas don’t have. Breastmilk contains the rich nutrients that nature’s chemistry prepared for the baby both biologically and psychologically. The baby sucks milk up to his fill with no downside.”

Going down-to-earth, it may need to be rammed in the throat that no human being can replicate, copy or reproduce the chemical contents of human breast milk. For infant formula ads to claim that their formula can increase child intelligence is unfair and almost misleading. Unfair to God, who alone knows the chemical contents He mixed into breastmilk. It is misleading because no human being can outperform the Master Designer, God, who is the only one who can develop the intelligence of a child.

How do you know your baby is obese? Just like adults, body mass index is the standard measurement used for child growth. An infant is overweight when his weight is bigger than his height. Standard values are based on the World Health Organization Child Growth Standards.

Underweight means low weight-for-age, stunting is low height-for-age or an indicator of chronic malnutrition while wasting is low weight-for-height or an indicator of acute malnutrition. Overweight is an indicator of overnutrition.

Statistics from the Food and Nutrition Research Institute in 2011 showed that there are more overweight children in the National Capital Region with 6.2 percent and the Ilocos Region with 6.3 percent than anywhere else in the country. Prevalence of overweight on a national scale is at 4.3 percent. (FREEMAN)