The UCL research published this week (Doctors sound alarm on child fitness and health, 21 August) is a timely reminder that we must get school sport and PE right if we're to achieve a legacy of health and fitness for girls in the UK. In 2012 we published research which showed that half of all girls (51%) are put off physical activity by their experiences of school sport and PE, despite three-quarters (74%) of girls saying they'd like to be more active. The UCL finding that just 38% of girls are getting the recommended amount of exercise has worrying implications for the future health of girls and women in the UK, and raises disturbing questions about the impact of the Olympic legacy.
Physical inactivity among girls is associated with a range of outcomes from obesity and low self-esteem to poor educational attainment. With school sport playing a key role in shaping attitudes to health and fitness, it's crucial that we get this right. The biggest challenge is to ensure that every child is fit and active, and we call on the government to make sure that girls (and boys) have the opportunity to try as many different sports and ways to be active as possible.
Sue Tibballs
Chief executive, Women's Sport and Fitness Foundation
• The news that half of all seven-year-olds exercise less than the recommended hour per day confirms that children spend too long at screens and not long enough outdoors. I agree with Simon Gillespie, chief executive of the British Heart Foundation, who last week recommended a return to an "outdoors childhood" as a way to combat rising childhood obesity and poor general health. Kids who spend time playing outdoors are happier and healthier.
Having interviewed over 100 families over the past three years making Project Wild Thing, a documentary about children's failing connection to nature, I believe the big question is what we can do to ensure children spend more time outside. The evidence is now overwhelming that an indoor existence damages children and society. Are we prepared to limit traffic, tone down shrill news about stranger danger, relax health and safety regulations, and open up the countryside to families? If not, we should expect to produce more sickly, unhappy children.
David Bond
London
• There is no doubt that physical activity has the potential to bring a wide range of health benefits. Liam Donaldson the former chief medical officer, went so far as to say if there was such a medication it would be regarded as a wonder drug. However, your subheadline makes a misleading link to obesity, which is far less clear. The key determinant in obesity is diet, and it would have been more powerful to make the connection with Gove's antipathy to improving school meals and the government's pathological fear of regulating the food industry. Taken together, diet and physical activity have the potential to save many lives and billions of pounds.
Neil Blackshaw
Little Easton, Essex
