Child body mass index in four cities of East China compared to Western references.

BACKGROUND

The rising trends in child obesity worldwide are poorly documented in China.

AIM

The present study compared the distribution of body mass index (BMI) by age in children from four cities in East China with Western references.

SUBJECTS AND METHODS

94 370 boys and 90 048 girls aged 0-19 years from Shanghai, Jinan, Xuzhou and Hefei were measured in 1999-2004 for length/height and weight. The LMS method was used to construct BMI centiles for each city. Shanghai children aged 0-6 years in 1986 and US and UK BMI references were used for comparison.

RESULTS

The median BMI curves for the four cities differed in shape from those for the USA and UK. Chinese boys were fatter than US boys in early to mid-childhood but less so in adolescence, and US boys were fatter at age 18. Within China the adiposity rebound was earlier in boys than girls. Shanghai children were appreciably fatter in 2000 than in 1986, and boys more so than girls.

CONCLUSIONS

The roots of child obesity lie in early life, particularly in boys, and are linked to economic development, which has important implications for both the aetiology of child obesity and the health of current and future Chinese children.