Argentina has the highest rate of infant obesity(2)

Also, acute child malnutrition rates are declining overall in the region, mostly with the poor. But poor nutrition associated with obesity is growing, and “poses greater risks,” Tonietti said.

She said that in the public hospital where she works, she often sees that families “do not even notice” that their child is overweight, as if it were just a natural part of life.

“One example: two obese parents come in with a child who is heavily overweight, and they say they are there because they were ‘sent by the traumatologist’. And when they are asked if there is a family history of obesity, they say no.”

Tonietti said this indicates that the capacity to identify the problem is being lost, which creates delays in coming up with solutions.

The probability that an overweight preschooler will become an overweight adult is 25 percent. In the case of schoolchildren, the likelihood rises to 50 percent, and for adolescents, the risk climbs to 80 percent, experts say.

At a conference on childhood obesity held last month in Buenos Aires, Carmuega called his colleagues’ attention to the need for early intervention.

At the conference, organized by CESNI and the Argentine Society of Obesity and Eating Disorders, Carmuega said “the only way to treat this problem is by trying to prevent it from happening.”

He recommended working with women who may be ready to have children to prevent overweight, and to help them control their diet during pregnancy. He also said breastfeeding is “perhaps the only vaccine” that protects children against obesity.

“We have to try to start earlier, working with women, through a strong intervention during the critical first 1,000 days of growth of the child,” he said.

Carmuega said Argentina had made “a major stride forward” when the center-left government of Cristina Fernández adopted the universal child benefit, a cash transfer that covers the children up to the age of 18 of unemployed parents and informal sector workers, rural workers and domestics with incomes below the minimum monthly wage.

But he also said it was necessary to “adapt all health policies” to the obesity seen in doctors’ offices, in order to urge families, doctors and schools to create “healthier environments” for children to grow up in.