China launches comprehensive guidelines to combat overweight, obesity in school children

China released new guidelines on Monday to ensure the physical and mental well-being of children by effectively controlling and preventing unhealthy weight gain and obesity among primary and secondary school students in China.

Released by the National Disease Control and Prevention Administration (NDCPA), along with the Ministry of Education, the National Health Commission (NHC) and the General Administration of Sport of China (GAS), the guidelines provide a clear three-stage preventive approach that includes prevention, early intervention and disease early warnings, the Xinhua News Agency reported on Monday.

Measures include nutritious diets, such as serving meals with less salt, oil, and sugar to elementary and secondary school students. The guidelines also detail scientific methods, such as urging schools to hire qualified nutrition professionals on a full- or part-time basis.

The guidelines are designed to promote measures ensuring students participate in daily physical exercises to maintain their physical health.

Additional steps comprise screening students for obesity, creating health records based on checkups, and promptly informing parents of the results.

Relevant authorities have also implemented a self-assessment checklist for evaluating students' risk of overweight and obesity, which enables schools and families to get early notifications by calculating scores with professional helps.

A series of concrete measures in the guidances is expected to comprehensively and systematically accelerate the control and prevention of unchecked weight gain and obesity among primary and secondary school students, and at the same time, the guidelines are also worth noting that it is China's efforts for the "Healthy China 2030" initiative, a participatory approach to improving China's healthcare and the fundamental goal of providing universal access to healthcare.

At present, approximately 10.4 percent of children under 6 years old are overweight or obese, and that nearly one-fifth of Chinese population between the ages of 6 and 17 suffer from overweight or obesity, according to Shen Hongbing, an academician from the Chinese Academy of Engineering (CAE) and the director of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), at the 10th China Obesity Science Conference held earlier this year, according to the Xinhua News Agency.