The children of wealthier parents are more likely to be overweight than those from poor households, a survey has revealed.

They are forced to leave their offspring with nannies or nurseries where not enough attention is paid to diet or physical exercise.

High consumption of snack foods and sweetened drinks, long hours spent watching TV and low rates of breastfeeding are also major factors…

Health experts said that the results were a warning to middle-class parents who often assume their children are living healthy lives…

The study, by the Institute of Child Health at University College London and Great Ormond Street Hospital, followed the lives of more than 13,000 children born in the UK between 2000 and 2002.

By the age of three, 23 per cent were overweight.

They were more likely to have weight problems if their mother had started work following their birth and the problems increased in proportion to the amount of time she worked.

‘Long hours of maternal employment, rather than lack of money, may impede young children’s access to healthy foods and physical activity,’ the researchers said…

There are now 13.3million working women - a total which is rapidly catching up with the number of working men.

In the last 25 years the number of stay-at-home mothers has fallen from nearly 55 per cent to just over 21 per cent…

Dr Colin Waine, chairman of the National Obesity Forum, said: ‘I do not want to condemn these women but I do think the priority has to be the health of the child and its continued health into adulthood.

‘We are in danger of raising a generation of young people with a much shorter life expectancy than previous generations.’

‘If women are working, there will be less time for food preparation and more resorting to convenience food…

Source: Daily Mail
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