Abstract
Overweight and obesity are major world global health challenges of the 21st century. Mexico is not an exception. Approximately 70% of the adult Mexican population has an excessive body weight. The prevalence of obesity and overweight in Mexican school children aged 5–11 is also high: one child in four is overweight. In light of the seriousness of the situation, the solutions for this problem are based on modification of the environments and change of individual habits and behaviors related to nutrition and physical activity. As a result, the Mexican government, public sector and academy established three common goals and 10 priority objectives that are expressed in the National Agreement for Nutritional Health—Strategy to Control Overweight and Obesity. The obesity problem requires interventions and policies that reside outside of the health sector domain, key aspects of this public health policy was agreement among all stakeholders on cross-cutting actions. The best examples of National Agreement's inter-sectorial action implementation is in the school setting and Code of ‘Self Regulation’ on Advertising of Food and Non-Alcoholic Beverages to Children introduced by the food and beverage industry. The ultimate goal of this national policy is to provide the strategic plan for healthy weight and better health, by promoting healthy lifestyles focused on correct diet and physical activity in all life stages, from pregnancy and early childhood and on into adulthood by a multi stakeholder approach. Although there have been great achievements in some areas of implementation, there are still challenges to confront.
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Change history
10 December 2013
A Correction to this paper has been published: https://doi.org/10.1038/ijo.2013.186
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Acknowledgements
Publication was supported in part by the Government of Aruba, the Obetech Obesity Research Center, the Pan American Health Organization and the Pan American Health and Education Foundation. This paper is derived from the workshop ‘Education for childhood obesity prevention: A life-course approach’, co-organized by the Panamerican Health Organization (PAHO) and the Panamerican Health and Education Foundation (PAHEF), and held on 14 June 2012 in Aruba, as part of the II Pan-American Conference on Childhood Obesity (http://www.paco.aw/).
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Latnovic, L., Rodriguez Cabrera, L. Public health strategy against overweight and obesity in Mexico's National Agreement for Nutritional Health. Int J Obes Supp 3 (Suppl 1), S12–S14 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1038/ijosup.2013.5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/ijosup.2013.5
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