Epode Background
- Childhood obesity can be prevented: from FLVS study to the EPODE methodology
- Fleurbaix Laventie Ville Santé (FLVS) Study
- From FLVS to EPODE
- EPODE, an innovative methodology
- More details on the EPODE methodology
Childhood obesity can be prevented: from FLVS study to the EPODE methodology
Prevention strategies for "civilization related disorders" should consider two main areas: changing the environment and changing behaviour.
Changing the environment
Changing the environment depends on processes linked to community health and sustainable development policies. Governments have a major role to play defining nutritional norms and standards, defining nutritional, food and physical activity policies, for example:
Removing vending machines from schools, restricting food and non-alcoholic beverage promotion to children, preparing recommendations on nutritional content of food items, strengthening food and non-alcoholic beverage labelling, promoting physical activity, supporting the development of public transport etc.
Changing the behaviour
All of these measures aim at modifying the environment. However, actions that have proven to be effective in the fight against smoking addiction, often used as an example, could not be as effective without sustainable behavioural changes.
An experiment carried out in Northern Karelia (Finland), aimed at reducing disease risk factors and improving the health of the population, has taken both environment and behaviour patterns into consideration (Puska, 2002). Emphasis was placed on changes that affected lifestyle, eating habits and tobacco addiction.
The results were outstanding: over 5000 premature deaths were prevented in Northern Karelia. Since 1977, the project has been extended to the whole country. As a result, life expectancy at birth has increased by six years.
The conclusions show that it is possible to increase nutritional knowledge and levels of physical exercise and to limit sedentary lifestyle in children through actions implemented in the school setting.
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Key References
- Commission of European Communities, 2007, "A Strategy for Europe on Nutrition, Overweight and Obesity related health issues"
- Romon M. & Al., 2008, "Downward trends in the prevalence of childhood overweight in the setting of 12-year school- and community-based programmes".
- Katan M.B., 2009, "Weight-loss diets for the prevention and treatment of obesity".
Following the first six main Dutch cities (Amsterdam, The Hague, Rotterdam, Utrecht, Veghel and Zwolle) joining the JOGG programme during 2010, the first half of this year, the second group of JOGG-towns started with 7 new municipalities (Tynaarlo, Borger-Odoorn, Meppel, IJsselstein, Delft, Leiden and Breda). The aim is that in 2015, 75 municipalities in the Netherlands will become active JOGG towns.
The Covenant on Healthy Weight is a unique collaboration of a total of 27 actors from (national and local) governments, industry and civil society organizations, which are collectively committed to fight against the rising trend of overweight and obesity. The main goals of the covenant are increasing awareness of health risks related to overweight and obesity and achieving an arrest in the evolution of overweight and obesity in children and adults.
