US study finds free school lunches contribute to obesity

A US study has found that government-funded school meal programs are putting children at risk of being overweight.

Associate Professor Wen You from Virginia Tech found that those children who were most likely to be overweight came from families who participate in both the school breakfast and lunch programs consistently throughout their elementary and intermediate school years. These children consume one-third to one-half of their daily meals at school.

“While well-intentioned, these government-funded school meal programs that are aimed at making kids healthy are in fact making participating students more at risk of being overweight,” said You, associate professor of agricultural and applied economics in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. “This study identifies the hardest battles in crafting policy to alleviate children in low-income populations being overweight.”

You’s findings, published in the journal Health Economics, utilised a nationally representative longitudinal data of 21,260 students who were followed from kindergarten to eighth grade, and controlled for the self-selection and income effects to examine school meal programs’ influence on the change in students’ body mass index. The study revealed that the longer children were in the programs, the higher their risk of being overweight.

The study reveals the need to go beyond merely raising nutrition standards, to comprehensively design programs which can provide not just healthy food that meets standards but healthy food that will be acceptable and appetising to children.

“Policymakers need to consider all the aspects of school meal programs — from availability and affordability to nutritional content and tastiness. It is important to have extra policy support that will allow funding for programs, such as chef-to-school and farm-to-school, as well as culinary training for cafeteria staff so kids actually enjoy eating what is ultimately prepared for them,” said You.