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Overweight Children

Volume 458: debated on Thursday 29 March 2007

To ask the Secretary of State for Health what estimate she has made of the proportion of children who were (a) overweight and (b) obese in each of the last 10 years, broken down by age. (129889)

The information is not available in the format requested. Data on obesity and overweight prevalence among children are available from the Health Survey for England. Data on obesity and overweight cannot be provided for individual ages, over a time series. The tables show the prevalence of obesity and overweight for children aged two to 10 and 11 to 15, for the last 10 years for which data are available.

Children's overweight and obesity prevalence, by survey year, 1995 to 2005, England

Percentage

1995

1996

1997

1998

1999

2000

2001

2002

Aged 2-10

Overweight

12.8

12.4

12.5

13.6

13.8

12.6

14.8

13.2

Obese

9.9

10.6

10.9

11.6

14.6

12.0

13.1

15.5

Overweight including obese

22.7

23.1

23.4

25.2

28.4

24.6

27.9

28.7

Aged 11-15

Overweight

13.6

14.2

14.0

15.2

14.3

12.3

15.8

14.7

Obese

14.4

14.3

15.9

16.9

16.1

18.5

18.2

19.5

Overweight including obese

28.1

28.6

29.9

32.1

30.4

30.8

34.1

34.2

Aged 2-15

Overweight

13.1

13.0

13.0

14.1

14.0

12.5

15.1

13.8

Obese

11.5

11.9

12.6

13.4

15.1

14.3

15.0

17.0

Overweight including obese

24.5

24.9

25.6

27.5

29.0

26.8

30.1

30.8

Bases (weighted)

2-10

2,527

2,783

4,089

2,552

1,262

1,094

2,129

4,654

11-15

1,293

1,363

2,043

1,301

665

624

1,223

2,726

2-15

3,819

4,146

6,132

3,853

1,927

1,718

3,352

7,381

Percentage

20031

20041

20051

20032

20042

20052

Aged 2-10

Overweight

14.0

14.2

14.3

14.0

14.7

14.2

Obese

13.7

14.3

16.7

13.8

14.5

16.8

Overweight including obese

27.7

28.5

30.9

27.8

29.1

31.0

Aged 11-15

Overweight

15.2

16.1

14.4

15.4

16.0

14.5

Obese

21.2

25.0

20.5

21.0

25.4

20.6

Overweight including obese

36.4

41.1

35.0

36.4

41.4

35.1

Aged 2-15

Overweight

14.5

14.9

14.3

14.6

15.2

14.3

Obese

16.5

18.3

18.0

16.6

18.8

18.3

Overweight including obese

31.0

33.2

32.4

31.2

34.0

32.6

Bases (weighted)

2-10

1,774

759

1,419

1,736

726

1,338

11-15

1,081

465

794

1,109

480

855

2-15

2,854

1,224

2,212

2,845

1,206

2,193

1 From 2003 data were also weighted for non-response. Data weighted for child selection only are provided for consistency with previous years.

2 Weighted.

Source:

The Health Survey for England: Uprating of tend tables to include 2005 data. The information Centre.