There’s No Escape: One In Three Children Fed Fast Food In An Irish Hospital Bed

One in three children between 6-12 years old admitted to hospital in Ireland is overweight or obese.

The study, undertaken at Children’s Ark, University Hospital, Limerick, also found that as many as one in three children also have at least one fast food meal during their hospital stay.

Researchers from University of Limerick and Dalhousie University in Canada looked at the types of food eaten by children in the hospital setting and noticed an abundance of fried food and a lack of water, brown bread, dairy products, fruit and vegetables.

One of the study’s authors and a consultant paediatrician at Mid-West Regional Hospital and University of Hospital Professor Clodagh O’Gorman said that there are approximately 145,000 paediatric admissions to hospital annually in Ireland.

“Limerick is probably representative of most of Ireland’s paediatric hospital wards. The incongruent abundance of fried foods in the hospital setting underlines the need for the introduction of age-appropriate nutrition guidelines," Professor Clodagh O’Gorman said.

She added; “Approximately 50 per cent of parents brought food into the hospital for their children. Of these, 60 per cent brought fast food from takeaway restaurants. Children in hospital should be given treats, but these numbers suggest that as many as 1 in 3 children have at least 1 fast food meal during their hospital stay.”

Professor Colum Dunne, one of the study’s authors and Director of Research, GEMS, UL said the study showed 34 per cent of the studied children between 6-12 years old were overweight or obese.

“Awareness and education of lifestyle choices are important, a challenge reinforced by our finding that nearly 67% of parents of overweight or obese children believed that their child was of normal weight,” Professor Dunne said.

This study comes after recent research revealed that there are enough obese or overweight children in Ireland to fill both the Aviva and Croke Park Stadiums.