Interpretation

The data presented only includes children participating in the National Child Measurement Programme (NCMP) in state maintained schools, any measurements taken at independent and special schools are excluded from the analysis.

Children are classified as (centiles are of the British 1990 growth reference (UK90) according to age and sex):

• Underweight if their body mass index (BMI) is less than the 2nd centile.

• Healthy weight if their body mass index (BMI) is between the 2nd and less than the 85th centile.

• Overweight if their body mass index (BMI) is on or above the 85th centile, but less than the 95th centile.

• Living with obesity if their body mass index (BMI) is on or above the 95th centile.

Local authority and region geographies are derived from the postcode of child residency; only children with valid geographical coding (postcode of residence) have been included in the analysis.

The data source combines the City of London totals with Hackney, and the Isles of Scilly totals with Cornwall to prevent potential disclosure of individuals. Explore Local Statistics cannot visualise data for combined areas so please refer to the original data source for this data.

Get the data

You can download this dataset in an XLSX, CSV or CSVW format, or download all available datasets in an XLSX or JSON-Stat format.

The original source data for this indicator can be found on the following page: Office for Health Improvement and Disparities(opens in a new tab).

Information on the strengths and limitations of the Explore Local Statistics service and methods used is available in the quality and methodology information (QMI) report.

Other indicators

Underweight prevalence in children at reception age is one of 104 local indicators on the Explore local statistics service. See the full list of local indicators.