An 8-year-old boy who weighs an astonishing 14 stone* may be taken into care to control his eating habits. But Connor McCreaddie’s mum says it’s the fault of doctors for failing to help them.
Our medical correspondent Thomas Moore reports:
Gammon, chips and not a trace of a vegetable. That’s tea at Connor McCreaddie’s house, a boy who tips the scales of 14 stone and he’s just 8 years old. Social workers are so alarmed by his eating problems that they’ve summoned the family to a child-protection conference. They could take him into care for his own well-being.
“When you’ve got a child who won’t eat anything healthy what can you give them? It’s been suggested that you just don’t give them anything and then he’ll eat it. Connor won’t. He’ll refuse. He’ll actually just go without and then whinge and whinge and whinge, have a tantrum and slam doors. At the end of the day you don’t just starve a child”.
Connor weighs four times as much as he should for his age. He’s broken 4 beds and 5 bicycles and he’s missed weeks of school because of the bullying but he still can’t bring himself to eat healthy food.
Connor’s family insist he’s lost a stone and a half since starting a diet two months ago, but he remains at high risk of diabetis and heart disease.
The Child Growth Foundation which tracks children’s size says Connor must be isolated from the temptations at home to change his eating patterns.
“There’s only one way that we can deal with Connor and that is to remove him from the environment, put him in to hospital, not into care but into a hospital where he will be on 24 hour surveillance from nurses and doctors who will start to put into place weight management programmes”.
But Connor’s mum denies that poor parenting has caused his obesity. She’s been asking for help since he was 5. But she was only given diet sheets.
“When he was going for check ups at the clinic, his weight was getting taken. He was going to the GP and he was getting weighed. But they’ve let it to go this far now and they’re blaming me”.
Whatever the reasons for Connor’s obesity, the family and the experts are agreed that somehow they have to find a way to bring his diet under control and save Connor from himself.
Thomas Moore, Sky News.
