Peer-reviewed article
Child nutrition to new stage in China: evidence from a series of national surveys, 1985–2015
Xinnan Zong, Hui Li, Ya-Qin Zhang, Hua‐Hong Wu ·
Summary
Written by AI, not yet AICS's view · claude-haiku-4-5-20251001This study tracked physical growth and nutrition status of over 600,000 Chinese urban and suburban children from birth to age 7 across 30 years (1985–2015). Stunting, underweight, and wasting declined dramatically, but overweight and obesity increased significantly, with overweight surpassing underweight by 2005. The growth rate has slowed in recent years, and suburban children now show higher overweight rates than urban children.
Key points
- Stunting prevalence fell from 12.21% to 0.97% in children under 5 between 1985 and 2015
- Underweight prevalence decreased from 4.44% to 0.59% in children under 5 over the same period
- Overweight prevalence increased from 0.70% to 3.48% in children aged 2–7 years
- Obesity prevalence rose from 0.17% to 0.86% in children aged 2–7 years
- Overweight and obesity rates in suburban children now exceed those in urban children in recent years
Limitations
This study presents descriptive trend data from national surveys and does not evaluate a specific intervention or explain the causes of the observed nutrition shifts. The findings apply only to urban and suburban Chinese children and may not reflect patterns in rural areas or other populations.
Abstract
BACKGROUND: Both child under- and over-nutrition are major global public health challenges. We aimed to examine thirty-year trends in physical growth, under- and over-nutrition in Chinese urban and suburban children between 1985 and 2015, and discuss implications for child health programmes. METHODS: A total of 610,785 urban and suburban children from birth to 7 years of age were collected from a series of large-scale national surveys in China. Height, weight and body mass index (BMI) Z-scores and prevalence of stunting, underweight, wasted and possible risk of overweight, overweight and obesity were calculated according to the World Health Organization (WHO) 2006 growth standards. The trends in the prevalence were tested across different survey years by Cochran-Armitage trend test. RESULTS: Rapid secular growth trend was observed in China over the past 30 years, but the trend showed a slowing sign in urban children in recent 10 years. The growth level of Chinese urban and suburban children surpassed the WHO 2006 growth standards in 2015. Between 1985 and 2015 the stunting, underweight and wasted prevalence decreased from 12.21, 4.44, 1.68 to 0.97%, 0.59, 0.87% for children under 5 years and from 12.69, 10.02, 3.41 to 0.42%, 0.67, 2.17% for children aged 5- < 7 respectively; the possible risk of overweight prevalence increased from 6.51 to 12.57%, overweight from 0.70 to 3.48% and obesity from 0.17 to 0.86% for children aged 2- < 7 and the increasing rates of overweight and obesity prevalence in suburban children first outnumbered urban children in recent 10 years. The overweight prevalence overtook the wasted or underweight in children aged 2- < 7 in 2005 and onward. CONCLUSION: Slowing secular height trend and overweight prevalence overtaking the wasted or underweight suggested child nutrition and health strategies should adjust swiftly and deliberately from primarily reducing under-nutrition prevalence to controlling rapid weight gain and promoting integrated early development.