Madam Speaker, first of all I would like to once again thank my colleague from Ottawa—Orléans for this motion.
Obesity is a chronic disease that is becoming increasingly prevalent among children and youth. Today, 26% of children between the ages of 2 and 17 are overweight or obese. Setting aside the statistics, we are dealing with children who are made to feel self-conscious by others. In addition to living with the physical problems caused by obesity, such as diabetes and respiratory difficulty, overweight children are often the targets of teasing and bullying in the street or schoolyard. The insults often leave permanent scars.
A study by Dr. Wendy Craig, a professor of psychology at Queen's University in Kingston, indicates that obese children are more often victims of abuse, which robs them of their confidence and self-esteem.
Dr. Rebecca Puhl, a professor at Yale University in Connecticut, has also studied the psychological effects of childhood obesity. In addition to affecting their self-image, abuse fuels their unhealthy eating habits and inactivity.
Childhood obesity also increases the risk of adult obesity. According to the Heart and Stroke Foundation, an obese 4-year-old is 20% more likely to become an obese adult. This rate increases to an alarming 80% for adolescents. Over the span of a quarter century, the rates of obesity among children and youth have almost tripled in Canada. We are now seeing children with “adult” problems such as high cholesterol, sleep apnea and high blood pressure.
We must remember that the causes of obesity can be a combination of social, cultural, environmental and economic factors and that some populations are at greater risk than others. Aboriginal populations have a high rate of obesity. Approximately 20% of aboriginal children aged 6 to 14 living off-reserve are obese. And for children living on-reserve the rate is even higher—26%.
One of the causes is that it is difficult for aboriginal people to access healthy food that is affordable. For example, a litre of pop is often three times cheaper than a litre of juice or milk.
Healthy and nutritious foods—fresh fruits and vegetables, for example—are more expensive and harder to find the further away we get from large urban centres. The rate of obesity is often higher in rural areas and in the far north of Canada.
Access to nutritious food is therefore a major part of the problem. Many people cannot afford to buy these foods. Over 800,000 Canadians need to use food banks to survive and, today, over 2.5 million Canadians are affected by food insecurity.
Nevertheless, the right to food is recognized by most of the major international conventions that Canada has signed. The first of these to come to mind may be the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, but there is also the Convention on the Rights of the Child. Article 24 of this binding treaty requires states parties to “combat disease and malnutrition...through the provision of adequate nutritious foods and clean drinking-water”.
The situation in Canada has deteriorated to the point where the UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food is here in Canada, and has been since Tuesday, on a mission to assess the situation. The rapporteur will consider access to healthy and affordable food for vulnerable groups such as children, aboriginal people and people in remote areas. He will examine factors such as obesity, malnutrition, and food production and distribution.
Today, junk food is everywhere and is offered at low prices by large fast food chains, while healthy, nutritious, locally produced foods are often more expensive and more difficult to find. Some elementary and secondary school cafeterias still have french fries, hot dogs and hamburgers on their menus. Some snack bars are strategically located close to schools. Young people simply have to cross the street at lunch time to get a poutine. This certainly does not help combat childhood obesity.
Physical inactivity is also an important contributing factor to the growing problem of childhood obesity. Many parents cannot afford to register their children in sports or to buy the equipment needed for these activities. In small communities, there is often not enough funding to build sports infrastructure. Even the way our cities are designed does not encourage people to be active. This motion makes it possible to continue the public debate on the critical issue of obesity. But right now, we need more than debate: we need to take action. All the experts are saying so.
Obesity is not just a health problem. It is a problem that is costly for society as a whole. A recent analysis conducted by the Public Health Agency of Canada showed that the total cost of obesity is estimated to be $4.3 billion—$1.8 billion in direct health care costs and $2.5 billion in indirect costs.
There is no more time to lose. Studies, expert committees and recommendations have been piling up for years, but the government still refuses to do anything about it.
This motion is based on the Declaration on Prevention and Promotion signed by federal, provincial and territorial health ministers, and on the framework for action on curbing childhood obesity. The declaration states that population health depends on environmental, social, economic and cultural factors in society. We need measures to tackle the social and environmental conditions I have just described: taking into account remoteness, the price of food, the need for infrastructure that supports physical activity and junk food regulation, among other things.
Unfortunately, I am not aware of any useful measures the government has introduced recently to address these issues. Worse still, Bill C-38 undermines all existing regulations that might help people achieve better health.
I would also like to remind the House that, in 2005, as I mentioned earlier in my question, the federal government set up a trans fat task force, which recommended limiting trans fat content to 2% of total fat content for all vegetable oils and spreadable margarines, and 5% for all other foods.
In 2007, the government agreed to all of the recommendations and gave the industry two years to voluntarily reduce trans fat content in its food products. Some companies took action, while others did nothing. In 2009, the Minister of Health, the current Conservative minister, promised to take further action, but we learned recently that the plan to draft regulations was aborted. In February, a research centre obtained documents under the Access to Information Act showing that in 2010, the minister ordered the regulatory plan scrapped.
Why? Such measures would have helped fight child poverty. That was one of the recommendations made by the Standing Committee on Health in 2007 when it studied the issue. The committee also recommended establishing childhood obesity reduction targets to bring the obesity rate down to 6% by 2020. The committee also recommended implementing measures with the first nations to address problems of access to food.
All of these measures could make a real difference in the fight against childhood obesity.
The NDP has always pushed for regulations governing trans fat content in foods. In 2004, the member for Winnipeg Centre introduced a private member's bill that was adopted unanimously.
Another group of experts, who studied sodium in processed foods, also made recommendations to the minister two years ago. We know that high sodium intake is a significant risk factor for high blood pressure, strokes and heart attacks. The working group recommended an annual reduction of 5% in sodium intake until 2016.
Guess what? The government decided to disband the working group. In December 2010, the minister said that she no longer needed the group. We do not know what strategy the government will adopt with respect to reducing sodium in food.
One member of the group, who is also the national coordinator of the Centre for Science in the Public Interest, had this to say:
What is worrisome, is not just that the group was dismantled, but that the minister has remained silent about the future of our recommendations. This suggests that the department is not on the same page as the group's experts.
So why is this government afraid of experts, researchers and scientific facts? Why set up working groups on trans fats, sodium, the environment, the F-35s and others, and then dismantle all these groups and reject all their recommendations? Is this government protecting the interests of some—industry, to name just one—to the detriment of all Canadians?
In short, with regard to what we are discussing today—childhood obesity—I will support the hon. member's motion, but at the same time, I would like to remind the House that, although the causes of obesity are complex, we know what can be done to tackle this issue. The time for debate and discussion is over: it is time for action.
I hope this government will take the action necessary to combat childhood obesity in order to protect children's health today and in the years to come, and will take into account the recommendations by the expert panels that it put in place itself.