National Child Obesity Strategy Debate
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Baroness Wyld
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National Child Obesity Strategy
Baroness Wyld Excerpts(6 years, 2 months ago)
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Baroness Wyld (Con)
My Lords, health visitors play a key role in helping parents to tackle and prevent obesity. Is my noble friend the Minister confident that all health visiting teams have the resources and the support they need to do this?
Lord O’Shaughnessy
My noble friend is absolutely right and as the noble Baroness, Lady Benjamin, said, it is about getting into families when children are young. My noble friend will I think be reassured, as I hope the House will, to know that not only are there more health visitors than ever but, as part of that, we have a healthy child programme looking at the prevention and identification of obesity. Health visitors are trained in critical elements such as promoting breastfeeding, nutrition and physical activity to encourage healthy babies.