YOU don't have to look far to see that the problem of child obesity is a serious one.

We may not have as high a proportion of overweight people as the United States but too much time sitting down in front of computers and TV screens along with unhealthy fast food diets is having a visible effect on our young people.

And as they get older, as Jamie Oliver has so effectively pointed out, we actually face the prospect of our children's average life expectancy falling unless we take action now.

But weighing children in classrooms and PE lessons is no kind of answer to a real problem.

Youngsters can be extremely cruel to each other and overweight children are likely to be picked on, ridiculed and bullied simply because they look different.

To subject them to such an ordeal in their sensitive early teens is outrageous.

A private medical examination where such matters can be discussed in confidence is one thing - a public humiliation in front of their peers is quite another.

Health officials need to think carefully about why they are likely to be the first in the country to re-introduce these weigh-ins.

It could be because other trusts have rightly turned their back on a programme which is likely to increase rather than decrease pupils' problems