Commentary: getting ahead of the childhood obesity curve.

In data for 5688 ch ildren , age-an d sex-specific com parison s of weigh t, h eigh t, body m ass in dex (BMI), an d skin fold data are m ade with an accepted British stan dard an d also with th e recen tly developed in tern ation al stan dard based on pooled data from several cou n tries. 3 Usin g th ese stan dards, th e au th ors also m ake age-an d sex-specific com parison s across eth n icity (Afro-Trin idadian , In do-Trin idadian , or m ixed) by age (5–6 years an d 8–9 years). Th ey con clu de th at both u n der-weigh t (In do-Trin idadian ch ildren) an d overweigh t (all ch ildren) are prevalen t, th at u n derweigh t is m ore prevalen t th an over-weigh t, an d th at, com pared to British ch ildren , th e Trin idadian ch ildren h ad a relatively cen tral distribu tion of body fat. However, th ey also raise n u m erou s m eth odological qu estion s th at h in der a clear in terpretation of th e data from a pu blic h ealth perspective.