Objectives: To investigate temporal trends in childhood and adolescent overweight/obesity in Jiangsu Province, China, evaluating the effects of age, period, and birth cohort.
Design: Cross-sectional study.
Sample: Participants were 210,168 students aged 6-17 years from the five waves of the consecutive cross-sectional Jiangsu provincial surveillance project in 2017-2021.
Measurements: Overweight/obesity was assessed according to the sex- and age-specific body mass index. We used age-period-cohort (APC) analysis to explore the temporal trends of overweight/obesity and to estimate the effects of age, period, and birth cohort on the prevalence.
Results: The overall prevalence of overweight/obesity has increased from 32.08% to 38.60% between 2017 and 2021. The 6-9-year-old group and the 10-13-year-old group were significantly associated with a higher risk of overweight/obesity, in contrast to 14-17-year-olds. The pandemic was also significantly associated with a much higher risk. The cohort 2000-2003 was associated with higher risk, and such association continued until the cohort 2012-2015, denoting a significantly lower risk.
Conclusions: Despite an increasing trend in the prevalence of overweight/obesity, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic, the latest cohort effect was significantly associated with a lower risk. We recommend continuous efforts on preventive interventions and more research about prevalence trends.
Keywords: age‐period‐cohort; children and adolescents; overweight/obesity; prevalence; trends.
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