Border initiative aims to tackle obesity

A €1 million initiative aimed at tackling obesity among children living in the Border regions has been welcomed by local community groups.

The project is being coordinated by the cross-Border health partnership CAWT (Cooperation and Working Together) which has repeatedly highlighted inequality of access to the health services endured by Border communities.

CAWT has predicted that it will directly intervene with more than 1,700 individuals during the three-year obesity project where the focus will be on prevention as well as helping families where obesity is already an issue.

Research published last year suggested that one in four nine year olds living in the Republic has a raised BMI (body mass index), which means that they are either overweight or obese.

Project manager Claire McGinley stressed that CAWT would not seek to “reinvent the wheel” and would build on the work already done tackling what experts have termed the “obesity epidemic”.

As part of its obesity prevention programme, the project will target 250 families with children under five years while another 100 families with overweight or obese children in the eight to 11 age group will receive advice and encouragement about healthy eating, active lifestyles and a positive mental health image.

“At the end of the day we will not be setting up boot camps.

“We will sit down with families and discuss what their needs are, what is achievable and how we can help them,” said Ms McGinley.

The project will operate in four pilot areas – the HSE West area of Donegal Sligo and Leitrim and also in the Monaghan, Cavan Louth region as well as in catchment areas around Derry, Tyrone, Fermanagh and Armagh.