University of Helsinki and Osaka University Childhood is an - - PowerPoint PPT Presentation
Karri Silventoinen University of Helsinki and Osaka University Childhood is an important phase of life and creates the base for all further life Childhood is the time of rapid physiological development Development in childhood can
Karri Silventoinen University of Helsinki and Osaka University
Childhood is an important phase of life and
creates the base for all further life
Childhood is the time of rapid physiological
development
Development in childhood can modify
metabolism and so affect strongly the further health profile
However also many health habits can be
Measuring childhood nutrition is challenging FAO offers information on food consumption
at country level, but it is difficult to measure how it is distributed within populations
Human anthropometrical measures offer a
shortcut to measure nutrition at population level
widely measured and used in scientific research
Childhood is very important phase of life in
the formation on adult anthropometrics
A) Height 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 Age Trait correlation Additive genetic correlation Specific environmental correlation B) Body mass index 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 Age correlation correlation
Trait correlations and additive genetic and specific environmental correlations of height and body mass index from 1 to 17 years of age with 18 years of age in Swedish twin boys
Source: Silventoinen et al. Int J Obes 2007 and Am J Hum Biol 2008
Over the human history malnutrition has been the major
problem in human populations
Human growth is sensitive for malnutrition and thus both
children and adult height reflects at population level inadequate nutrition in childhood
At population level most part of variation of height is
because of genetic differences between individuals, but also variation in environmental factor affects individual differences
to separate genetic and environmental parts of variation
Association between height and standard of living can be
seen when comparing populations
Association between height and health gives evidence how
childhood nutrition affect health status in adulthood
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100% Australia men Australia women Denmark men Denmark women Finland men Finland women Italy men Netherlands me Netherlands women Norway men Norway women Sweden men Sweden women US men US women Additive genetic factors Common environmental factors Specific environmental factors
Estimates of variation of height explained by genetic factors, environmental factors shared by co-twins and environmental factors unique foe each twin individual
Silventoinen et al Twin Res 2003 and Am J Hum Biol 2004
150 155 160 165 170 175 180 185 1920-1929 1930-1939 1940-1949 1950-1959 1960-1969 Finnish men Swedish men Finnish women Swedish women
Silventoinen et al Eur J Public Health 2001
Prevalence of stunting among pre-school children 1990- 2020 based on WHO references Onis et al, Publ Health Nutr 2011
Hazard ratios for CHD incidence in adulthood per 1 unit increase in z-scores of height from 7 to 13 years of age in Danish children
0.85 0.87 0.89 0.91 0.93 0.95 0.97 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 Age Boys Girls Hazard ratio Source: Silventoinen et al. 2012 PLoS One
Cognitive test performance in Finnish and Danish elderly twins Both in Finland and Denmark shorter height was associated with poorer performance in cognitive test Indicates that chilhood nutrition has effect also on cognitive development seen still decades later
In recent decades, excess nutrition has become a major health
problem globally
Obesity leads to multiple severe health problems
cancers, low self-esteem, social discrimination
Still a problem especially in industrialized countries following
Westernized lifestyle, but an increasing problem also in many middle income societies
Many societies suffer double burden having both malnutrition
and excess nutrition
families
In Western countries obesity is linked to poor socio-economic
position
Ng et al. Lancet 2014
Ng et al. Lancet 2014
20 22 24 26 20 22 24 26 Managers Professionals Clerical employees Manual workers Statistical significance of the interaction between country and occupational position: P=0.015 Silventoinen et al. J Epi 2013
20 22 24 26 20 22 24 26 Managers Professionals Clerical employees Manual workers Statistical significance of the interaction between country and occupational position: P<0.0001 Silventoinen ym. J Epi 2013
.4 .6 .7 .8 .9 1 1 5 10 15 18 Age in years .05 .1 .15 .2 .25 .3 .35 .4 .45 .5 .55 1 5 10 15 18 Age in years
Silventoinen et al., Int J Obes 2009 Genetic factors Common environmental factors
20 40 60 80 100 Low Medium High Physical activity
BMI Waist circumference Fat percent of total body mass Silventoinen et al., Am J Clin Nutr 2009
Ahmad et al., PLoS Genet, 2013
Childhood nutrition has long lasting health effects Poor childhood nutrition is a risk factor for metabolic
diseases but also cognitive performance in old age
In Western societies, but increasingly also in middle
income countries, obesity has replaced malnutrition as the major public health problem
Just as for height, genetic factors have major effect on
individual differences in body mass index
Socio-economic differences in obesity are also a dominant
feature in Western countries
However environment modifies both genetic effects and
socio-economic differences in obesity
Twin studies offer an effective way to analyze genetic
effects globally since information on twins has widely been collected
Osaka Twin Day 2014