Shortening stature: Addressing the decline in children's health

This election year marks a crucial juncture when we evaluate our national priorities: few would argue against the health of our children being high up the list. However, to date, children’s dietary health has not been taken sufficiently seriously. Policy in this area has been lacklustre and wholly insufficient to address the severity of the problem.

Our new report demonstrates how in recent years, we’ve seen a disconcerting deterioration in children’s health and wellbeing with obesity levels surging by 30% since 2006 and the incidence of type 2 diabetes among adolescents increasing by 22% since 2017. These conditions driven by calorie dense diets are deeply worrying but equally concerning and substantially less talked about, are the results of poor-quality diets - which are increasingly impacting on our children, and often paradoxically seen in combination with obesity.

Here, we delve into one of the metrics in the new report: children's growth. 

Data from the Non-Communicable Diseases Risk Factor Collaboration paints a stark picture: in the UK, the average height of children aged 5 was progressively increasing year on year up to 2013, but then it reversed with the average height of five year-olds now declining.

While short height is not inherently problematic, linear growth is representative of broader development of a child, and therefore, these troubling findings are indicative of wider health and well-being repercussions. The data paint a worrying picture regarding the current health status of our children and the downwards trajectory that they are facing. However, our politicians have the power to turn this around.  

It is well known that our genes and ethnicity influence our height, but the impact of modifiable environmental factors are often overlooked in the UK. At younger ages and at a population level, changes over time are more likely to be indicative of these environmental factors like nutrition, stress, infection and poverty, rather than genetics. Essential nutrients like zinc (needed for protein synthesis, cell division and growth hormone production) and calcium, phosphorus and magnesium (needed for bone development) are integral to children reaching their full growth potential. Making sure that children are getting sufficient intake of nutritious food is paramount to them growing up healthy. 

These data raise fundamental questions regarding the nutritional quality of food that children are able to access, in addition to wider socio-economic forces that shape the conditions for the optimal growth of young children during their first few years. The findings suggest that poor diets are substantially impacting UK children, particularly the most deprived - coinciding with the introduction of austerity measures pointing to a possible explanation. The cost of living crisis over the past three years, is highly likely to have exacerbated the situation.  
  
For all children to grow up healthy and reach their full potential, it is essential they have access to a diet that provides all the essential nutrients. Failure to intervene to protect children from poor diets will likely mean this trend continues, with severe long-term health consequences for our children. But this worrying trend is entirely reversible and should be an important target for a new government to prioritise. We need strong, preventive policies that can improve access and affordability to nutritious food and shape healthy food environments:  

• Expand eligibility, improve uptake and increase the value of Healthy Start. 
• Increase the volume of fruit and vegetables served at snack times and mealtimes in schools and expand the School Fruit and Vegetable Scheme so that all primary school children can benefit.  
• Update School Food Standards to decrease sugar and increase veg and introduce monitoring on compliance. 
• Expand eligibility for Free School Meals and auto-enroll all eligible children with the goal of providing Universal Free School Meals. 
• Require that the cost of healthy and sustainable diets be taken into account when setting benefits levels and the minimum wage. 
• Hold a national food summit to develop a clear plan for ending food insecurity in Britain.