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Bleak picture of children robbed of potential

By KARL WILSON in Sydney | China Daily | Updated: 2020-02-24 09:15
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Bushfire affected land is seen in Buchan, Victoria, Australia, Jan 23, 2020. [Photo/Agencies]

The young worldwide face threats from climate change and harmful marketing

The health and future of every child and adolescent in the world today is under immediate threat from ecological degradation, climate change and exploitative marketing that push fast food, sugary drinks, alcohol and tobacco at children, a report says.

The report was written by a commission of experts set up jointly by the World Health Organization, the United Nations Children's Fund and the medical journal The Lancet, and was financed by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Titled A Future for the World's Children?, it includes a new global index of 180 countries comparing performance on child survival and well-being, based on health, education, nutrition and sustainability, as well as greenhouse gas emissions and equity or income gaps.

China is ranked 43 out of 180 for its performance on survival, just behind the United States on 39. Norway was ranked number one.

The report, published globally last week, found no single country is adequately protecting children's health, their environment and their futures.

"Despite improvements in child and adolescent health over the past 20 years, progress has stalled, and is set to reverse," said Helen Clark, former prime minister of New Zealand and co-chair of the commission.

"It has been estimated that around 250 million children under five years old in low-and middle-income countries are at risk of not reaching their developmental potential, based on proxy measures of stunting and poverty. But of even greater concern, every child worldwide now faces existential threats from climate change and commercial pressures.

"Countries need to overhaul their approach to child and adolescent health, to ensure that we not only look after our children today but protect the world they will inherit."

While the poorest countries need to do more to support their children's ability to live healthy lives, excessive carbon emissions, disproportionately from wealthier countries, threaten the future of all children, the report says.

If global warming exceeds 4 C by 2100 in line with current projections, this would lead to devastating health consequences for children, due to rising ocean levels, heatwaves, proliferation of diseases such as malaria and dengue, and malnutrition.

Self-regulation failed

The report also highlights the threat posed to children from harmful marketing. Evidence suggests that children in some countries see as many as 30,000 advertisements on television alone in a single year, and youth exposure to vaping (e-cigarettes) advertisements increased by more than 250 percent in the US over two years, reaching more than 24 million young people.

"Industry self-regulation has failed," said one of the report's authors, Professor Anthony Costello.

Studies in Australia, Canada, Mexico, New Zealand and the US, among many others, have shown that self-regulation has not hampered commercial ability to advertise to children, he said.

"For example, despite industry signing up to self-regulation in Australia, children and adolescent viewers were still exposed to 51 million alcohol ads during just one year of televised football, cricket and rugby. And the reality could be much worse still: we have few facts and figures about the huge expansion of social media advertising and algorithms aimed at our children."

Children's exposure to commercial marketing of junk food and sugary beverages is associated with buying unhealthy foods and overweight and obesity, linking predatory marketing to the alarming rise in childhood obesity. The number of obese children and adolescents rose from 11 million in 1975 to 124 million in 2016, an 11-fold increase, with dire individual and societal costs.

The commission's authors called for a new global movement centered on children, with new policies and investments to improve child health and rights, and to incorporate their voices into policy decisions.

They recommended that CO2 emissions be terminated immediately to safeguard the future of the young.

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