Overweight and obesity in children are also malnutrition problems. Photo: Gorditos de Corazón Foundation.
At least 500,000 Colombian children under the age of 5 are overweight or obese. According to experts, 70% of these cases are related to poor eating habits. Although these children do not suffer from hunger, they are also at risk of dying.
Malnutrition is a public health problem in Colombia. This is what the Colombian government has declared after addressing the serious situation in La Guajira, where at least ten children have died so far in 2016 from causes associated with this disease.
Nearly 900 more minors have shown worrying weight and nutrition problems due to lack of food, results that were known after being evaluated by official commissions, made up of Family Welfare, the Attorney General's Office and local authorities, who closely monitor the food crisis in the region.
However, there is a contrasting reality in the country. One that often finds malnutrition as the root of the problem registered in the north of the country and which has also been declared by the authorities as a public health problem.
These are overweight or extremely obese minors who are on the path to developing diseases such as diabetes, hypertension, respiratory problems, heart or cerebrovascular conditions that, without exaggeration, could slowly lead to death.
«En el país, el 52% de la población sufre de sobrepeso u obesidad. Entre el 3% y el 5% son niños menores de 5 años y se cree que el 70% de estos casos es provocado por la alimentación inadecuada o hábitos de vida insanos», afirma el doctor Henry Yupanki, médico endocrinólogo y director científico de la Fundación Colombiana de Obesidad, Funcoboes.
The Gorditos de Corazón Foundation, a Colombian NGO dedicated to preventing these types of eating disorders, revealed that each year they receive 4,360 requests for help from citizens with overweight and obesity problems.
After a selection process, around 2,000 cases are entered into the database to assess the level of severity and the management required. Of these admitted cases, 75% are women, 15% to 20% are children under 12 years of age and 10% are men.
Salvador Palacios, director de esta organización también asegura que «son pacientes hasta los 40 años que nos están pidiendo ayuda porque además ha sido difícil que el Estado garantice sus tratamientos o cirugías para intentar superar su estado crónico».
For 10 years, the Gorditos de Corazón Foundation has been offering support to obese people throughout the country and carries out the greatest number of interventions possible in extreme cases, that is, those in which the life of the obese person is in serious danger.
Sus voceros admiten que, dentro de ese porcentaje de menores, cada año en promedio 3 bebés, entre 1 y 5 años, con casi 4 veces el peso que deberían tener, son «rescatados» de esta terrible condición.
They also explain that overweight sometimes begins in the womb of the pregnant mother and other times is due to bad eating habits put into practice by their parents or guardians when they are just born.
Gorditos de Corazón receives the annual report of the death of at least one minor due to medical complications related to obesity.
The last survey on the country's nutritional situation dates back to 2010. It was directed and applied at the time by Bienestar Familiar, the National Institute of Health, the Ministry of Social Protection, the DANE and Profamilia, and was applied in 50,670 Colombian households in 258 municipalities across the country.
The survey revealed that between 2005 and 2010 the prevalence of overweight and obesity in children between 5 and 17 years of age increased by 25.9% and that 1 in 6 children and adolescents was overweight or obese. The results of a new survey (ENSIN 2015) are about to be published, according to the ICBF.
«Es el otro extremo de los casos de desnutrición que registra el país y que merece la misma alerta pues aunque solo contamos con los datos de esta encuesta (ENSIN 2010) la tendencia es al aumento debido al nuevo estilo de vida, al incremento del sedentarismo, al impacto de la tecnología, a la fuerte publicidad de la industria alimentaria, a los hábitos modernos de alimentación y, aunque parezca curioso, la relación aumenta a medida que es más alto el nivel educativo de la madre y el nivel del SISBEN porque con más capacidad para comprar alimento chatarra mayor es el problema», asegura la doctora Irene De La Peña, encargada del manejo metabólico de la Clínica Colombiana de Obesidad y Metabolismo.
The expert adds that the issue of weight during the first years of life, for example during breastfeeding, is not a cause for concern as long as the child is in the development stage and is directly proportional to his or her height, but if at the 3-year check-up the height is one and the weight is out of date, according to the control tables and references of the World Health Organization, the situation is cause for concern.
Specialists and counselors from civil or private organizations that deal with this problem on a daily basis agree that the causes of overweight and obesity in children are subject to several factors.
1. Genetic problems that could represent 20% of cases of overweight or obese children in the country, according to calculations by the Colombian Obesity Foundation.
2. Environmental factors that generate changes in the genetic codes and may ultimately cause the disease; for example, the eating habits of a community regarding the consumption of fatty foods that are passed down from generation to generation and which will cause the child to be born overweight.
3. That the baby has a high weight or height, greater than 4 kilos, (macrosomia) at the time of birth due to gestational diabetes in the mother, which causes the child to have a tendency to be obese due to metabolic failures.
4. Low weight due to lack of nutrients during pregnancy, which causes the child to eat more than necessary at birth and the body to be programmed to reserve energy.
5. Overfeeding children with formulas that are inappropriate for their age or, when they are developing, excessive supply of foods rich in fats, carbohydrates and sugars.
Regarding this last factor, the cultural aspect is key.
«Muchas madres tienen la concepción de que el niño más gordito es el más sano y desde pequeños propician hábitos errados de alimentación que desatan el sobrepeso y luego la obesidad en los menores de la familia», agrega la doctora De la Peña, también especialista en medicina estética.
The above is complemented by more data from the National Survey of the Nutritional Situation in Colombia, which states that 1 in 3 Colombians between 5 and 64 years of age do not consume fruit daily and 5 in 7, between the same ages, do not consume vegetables or greens daily.
However, 7% of this population does eat sausages every day and 1 in 4 eats fast food weekly as well as sweets and candy with the same frequency.
«La edad crucial para evitar el sobrepeso es entre los 6 y los 10 años, cuando el niño deja de crecer linealmente (estatura) para darle prelación al desarrollo hormonal y neurológico», explica Benjamín Ramírez, doctor en bioquímica, nutrición humana y máster en enfermedades crónicas.
Ramírez añade que «la talla baja de un niño tiene relación con el sobrepeso en la medida en que ese cuerpo no gasta mucha energía y por la influencia del medio ambiente que lo rodea todo lo que come lo va a aumentar de peso. Lo que sucede es que en Colombia no hay consultas de programación fetal que permitan estudiar el desarrollo del bebé en el transcurso del embarazo. El diagnóstico de sobrepeso por peso y talla no es suficiente. Se debería tener en cuenta el estudio del esqueleto, de los tejidos, de las medidas de ese niño».
El director científico de la Fundación Colombiana de Obesidad, Hernán Yupanki opina que si bien ya existe una ley que define la obesidad y enfermedades asociadas como una prioridad para controlar, atender y prevenir, el Estado está en deuda de reglamentarla para establecer programas de peso y nutrición bien organizados con el que se garantice el diagnóstico y la remisión a pediatría y endocrinología de cada uno de esos niños obesos o con sobrepeso».
While NoticiasRCN.com approached these specialists about the problem of at least 500 thousand overweight children estimated to exist in the country, the Gorditos con corazón Foundation responded to the clamor of a family from Montelíbano, Córdoba regarding the dramatic case of the smallest of its members: a baby only 9 months old, weighing 20 kilos, with difficulty moving and breathing and in urgent need of care to prevent her health from worsening due to some illness derived from her extreme obesity.
Mónica Vengoechea/NoticiasRCN.com