Too Hot To Play? Researcher Says Childhood Inactivity Increasing Because Of Climate Change

Scientists say that record highs of obesity and physical inactivity among children leave many struggling to regulate their body temperature in heat, leading them to do less exercise. Environmental physiologist Dr. Shawnda Morrison is sounding the alarm in a comprehensive review of studies on this topic.

She says physical fitness is the key to tolerating higher temperatures and unfit children could face heat-related health problems such as dehydration, heat cramps, heat exhaustion, or heat stroke as global warming continues.

According to Dr. Morrison’s study, published in the journal Temperature, children are 30 percent less aerobically fit than their parents were at their age, with fewer children reaching the World Health Organization’s recommendation of 60 minutes of exercise a day.

Dr. Morrison criticized failures to sufficiently prioritize children’s health needs in climate change policy, arguing more action is necessary to get children exercising so they will cope in a hotter world.

One study found more children visited the emergency room on hotter days, with young children more likely to need emergency care. The COVID-19 pandemic made children less likely to exercise, particularly when schools closed, and Dr. Morrison fears rising heat could similarly obstruct children from physical activity. Another found overweight kids were twice as likely to have difficulty regulating their body temperature when exercising outdoors.

Dr. Morrison notes children regulate heat differently, adding that they are not just smaller adults. They sweat less, increasing blood flow to the skin to cool down instead, and this makes their hearts work harder than adults. Despite this, previous research on global warming’s impact on physiological health has focused on adults. Moreover, little research on kids and heat took place 15 to 30 years ago, when children were much fitter than they are today.

“Fitter adults are better able to tolerate higher temperatures, due to a combination of physiological, behavioral and psychological factors,” Dr. Morrison says in a media release. “Yet, as the world warms, children are the least fit they have ever been. It is imperative that children are encouraged to do daily physical activity to build up, and maintain, their fitness, so that they enjoy moving their bodies and it doesn’t feel like ‘work’ or ‘a chore’ to them.”

Source: https://bit.ly/3A49Jxy