Mums, stop overfeeding your babies!

Mums, stop overfeeding your babies!

    Anew British research says mothers tend to overfeed their children, who are already overweight, simply because they are unable to tell if they are too chubby. The researchers, who observed about 300 mothers, said the women were unable to correctly judge the weight of their toddlers. The tendency, they said, may lead to the kids being obese later.
    Dietician Rebecca Byrne questioned 276 mothers to describe their children — between 12 and 16 months old — as either underweight, normal weight or overweight. Her team then measured the weight and height of the children. They found that 27 per cent of the mothers
thought of their children as being too thin,
whereas only one of the toddlers was actually
underweight.
    Also, while 32 per cent of toddlers were actually overweight, only four per cent (12 of the 276 toddlers) were deemed as too heavy by their mothers. Around 27 per cent of British children are now overweight, as per statistics.
    Weight gain that is rapid before two years of age is associated with a two to threefold increase in the risk of obesity later in life, according to experts. The researchers concluded that mothers need to understand normal child growth and detect if their children are having weight problems.