Dr. Sara Dockrell:

I thank the committee for inviting me to speak. This is not a brand new issue but something that has been highlighted for quite some time. The issue of carrying schoolbags affects large numbers of children in Ireland and around the world. It is a global issue. One of the factors that tends constantly to raise its head is the weight of schoolbags. It is where most of the emphasis of the research is but there is a lot of evidence, including our own, to support the fact that the weight of the schoolbag is not the main factor when it comes to causing musculoskeletal pain in children.

Some countries have established guideline weights, and they have actually legalised them. Throughout Europe and in the United States, Australia and New Zealand, the guideline weight tends to be around 10% of the child's body weight. However, there is increasing evidence that 10% of body weight is not a reliable measure. In the current climate of obesity in children, that weight is also very unrealistic because 10% of a child who is obese is not a fair method of assessment of how much he or she would be able to carry.

From our research, we concluded that there is no merit in establishing guidelines for children based on the schoolbag weight alone, so we looked at other issues and what could be done. We took a more proactive outlook on this and looked at other aspects of the schoolbag, such as the type of bag, how it is carried and when it is carried.

Another factor that came out of our research was that there is very little evidence to identify whether parents are aware of the schoolbag issues. We recently got ethics approval to do a study on parental awareness of what their children are carrying and how they are carrying it. There is no evidence that parents have ever received information about this topic, and we believe that if parents received information they would be better informed and they might be able to tackle the issue in a much more positive and proactive way.

One of the positive factors regarding schoolbag carriage is that children require exercise and movement to develop in a healthy way. The carrying of a schoolbag is considered to be moderate to vigorous activity for children. As is widely known, children are supposed to have 60 minutes of moderate to vigorous activity a day. Looking at this in a positive way, carrying a schoolbag could in fact be considered to be part of a child's daily activity. This is an important point at the moment, where children are very sedentary. This could be seen as a very positive thing.

I am very keen to try to heighten awareness of the issues in a very well structured way so that parents, teachers and all the stakeholders who are involved in this process have a better understanding of what carrying a schoolbag is about.