Professor Michael Turner:

I think the Senator is right and I am sorry that I did not give it as much attention in the first round of answers as I should have. It should be part of the routine GP care that young children should be assessed because one of the problems is that parents sometimes do not recognise obesity in their own children. Sometimes they can be very sensitive. When we came to measure the fathers, there were two fathers who would not step on the weighing scale and it was obvious to everybody that they were both morbidly obese. There is a sense of denial when it comes to the obesity issue. As part of the new under six contract, children should be assessed for obesity at certain milestones, because early intervention in childhood is far more productive than waiting until their teenage years. Again, it is linked to dietary policies and physical activity and sports, so it touches on that in terms of national policy. If every GP had to do the same measurements as part of their GP care, people would not move from one general practitioner to another because they did not like what the first GP had to say. I think it is something that needs to be tackled at the level of primary care.

In terms of the statistics, there are some issues nationally that the committee needs to be aware of so Dr. McDonnell might comment on those.