WHO Guidelines on Sleep and Physical Activity for Infants, Children

The benefits of physical activity for adults are well known, but it is equally important for infants and young children, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), which issued new guidelines in April and presented them last week at the European Conference on Obesity (ECO) held in Glasgow.The organization is recommending no screen time for children under one year and instead, adopt more playtime to lower the risk of obesity.“Physical inactivity has been identified as a leading risk factor for global mortality and a contributor to the rise in overweight and obesity,” the authors wrote in the guidelines. “By providing this guidance, the recommendations fill a gap in the WHO recommendations on physical activity, as children under 5 years of age were not included in the Global recommendations on physical activity for health in 2010.”In this slideshow, we review the guidelines.REFERENCE:  Guidelines on Physical Activity, Sedentary Behaviour, and Sleep for Children Under 5 Years of Age:  World Health Organization. http://bit.ly/2LrqFql