Childhood obesity grows annual health bill

Medical X-Press – Staff Writer

Childhood obesity is costing Australian taxpayers $43.2 million annually—not including the cost of hospital care—and will grow unless prevention programs are adopted, new research by Monash University shows. The study, conducted by a team from Monash Business School’s Centre for Health Economics – Dr. Nicole Black, Robert Hughes and Professor Andrew Jones – analysed data on 3458 children from the Longitudinal Study of Australian Children linked to their Medicare records. (more)