OBESITY IN BARBADIAN children has already reached epidemic stages and authorities are looking to get children involved in the fight to stem the rise in childhood diabetes.
Staff at Maurice Byer Polyclinic, Station Hill, St Peter, are playing their part to sensitize primary school children to the dangers of chronic diseases. Seven years ago they started a Diabetes Poster/Poetry Competition for seven- to nine-year-olds at the 16 primary schools in the catchment area.
This year it attracted eight schools in the form of All Saints, St Bernard’s, St Silas, Gordon Greenidge, St Elizabeth, Half Moon Fort, Ignatius Byer and Roland Edwards.
During the awards ceremony at the polyclinic yesterday afternoon, the Ministry of Health’s Chief Public Health Nurse Claudette Casey told participants and other stakeholders that a report prepared by the Queen Elizabeth Hospital (QEH) showed that 25 per cent of children in Barbados were obese.
