Rate of underweight or overweight children increases in Brazil – 03/23/2023 – Health

In the last three years, the number of families going hungry in Brazil has grown, as has the overweight and obese population.

Despite being contradictory, these two scenarios have a common cause, which is the lack of food access policies and the crisis caused by the Covid pandemic.

This was also reflected in children: the number of underweight children considered normal rose and the proportion of the pediatric population overweight or obese increased in the last four years.

In 2018, 4.2% of children aged 2 to 5 years were underweight (which includes thinness and markedly thinness), while 5.22% were obese. In 2022, these rates increased to 4.36% and 5.34%, respectively. Regarding normal weight (eutrophic), the proportion went from 64.55% in 2018 to 65.33% in 2022.

Regarding children aged 5 to 10 years, 4.08% of children were underweight in 2018, against 3.69% in 2022. The proportion of eutrophic children also decreased, from 65.49% to 63, 23%.

On the other hand, in 2018 the proportion of children with obesity and severe obesity were 8.9% and 4.99%, increasing to 10.15% and 6.03%, respectively, in 2022. In absolute numbers, they are almost 500,000 children in this age group with obesity in the country, of which 330,000 are severely obese.

The data are from the Sisvan platform (Food and Nutrition Surveillance System) of the Ministry of Health. The numbers bring an alert to the problems related to children’s health and nutrition, according to specialists.

“Malnutrition in childhood can affect growth when it is prolonged, but that does not mean that the overweight child does not also suffer consequences. You can have an overweight child with a lack of nutrients”, explains the coordinator of pediatric endocrinology at the Sabará Children’s Hospital, Matheus Alvares.

According to him, the increase in children and adolescents with metabolic complications due to overweight is already visible. “And that will cause other problems in adult life.”

As well as access to health and education, the right to food also goes through an unequal scenario in the country, explains Janine Coutinho, coordinator of the Healthy Food Program of Idec (Brazilian Institute of Consumer Protection).

For her, overweight is related to the increased consumption of ultra-processed and processed foods in the school and family environment, which lack the necessary nutrients for the proper growth of children. “These are two outcomes of the same determinant, which is access and the way in which that family feeds itself.”

Data from Enani (National Study of Child Food and Nutrition) for 2019 show that the consumption of ultra-processed foods among children under five years of age was 93% in the country, while that of fruits and vegetables was 27.4%. The most recent report, for 2022, has yet to be released.

The report requested information on public policies aimed at child health and nutrition from the federal government.

In a note, the MEC (Ministry of Education) said that the PNAE (National School Feeding Program) is considered an axis of public policies aimed at food security and that the federal transfer foreseen in 2023 is R$ 5.5 billion (compared to BRL 4 billion in 2022).

He also stated that the preparation of school meals follows the Brazilian Food Guide: it is forbidden, for example, to supply ultra-processed foods, sugar and added sweetener to children under three years old. It is also prohibited to offer industrialized trans fats on all menus, said the folder.

The MDA (Ministry of Agrarian Development and Family Agriculture) stated that it was recreated with the aim of strengthening family production of healthy foods and, although “current legislation establishes at least 30%, it works to ensure that the acquisition of agricultural products familiar reach 100%”.

There are 2.7 million registered family farmers, according to the ministry, and, in addition to actions with the MEC, the agency promotes actions to improve logistics and spaces for offering family farming products, such as urban gardens and productive backyards.

The Ministry of Health did not respond at the time of publication of this text.

Food prices lead to the consumption of ultra-processed foods

With the increase in the number of families living in extreme poverty and going hungry, the consumption of fresh food has dropped. And, when there is the possibility of eating something, snacks and foods like instant noodles are the most accessible, says the researcher from Idec.

“You can’t talk about hunger without talking about the social issue, and it got much worse in the country. We had a certain amount of protection in the price of basic foodstuffs. [projetada] until 2026, but the pandemic anticipated this, and the increase was proportionally greater in basic foodstuffs, such as rice, beans and meat”, he observes.

The difficulty in accessing food often makes school meals the only daily meal for a significant portion of children, but even this has suffered in recent years due to the lack of public policies, such as the readjustment of the value passed on by the federal government, which was paralyzed for five years. This year, Lula (PT) announced a 39% readjustment of the transfer for school lunches.

There is also legislation that establishes a minimum percentage of 30% for purchasing products from family farming in school lunches, but this rate is often not achieved where there is a lack of inspection or where the logistics for delivering products is difficult.

Coutinho recalls that even policies banning the sale of ultra-processed foods in schools do not fully guarantee the protection of children, as the products are sold freely in the surrounding area. “[Essa proteção] it also goes through education policies and legislation. Today, organic or family farming products are up to five times more taxed than processed foods.”

Project in Sergipe

An IPTI (Institute for Research in Technology and Innovation) project started last year in schools in the Sergipe municipality of Santa Luzia do Itanhy, about 77 km from Aracaju, helps connect cooks and family producers.

Named Nham (an acronym for Nutrition for a Healthy and Appetizing Meal), the application connects to another system also created by the institute, called TAG, which has information on height, weight, health history and other relevant data of students at school.

The cooks use data on the children who are at school that day and whether they have special dietary needs to prepare the menu.

“From there, they make the choices according to the needs of the day and ask the farmers directly for the products”, explains Saulo Barretto, one of the IPTI board members who coordinated this project. “The next stage is the implementation of training courses offered by the cooks themselves in other schools.”