A new public health report says economic inequality has wide-ranging effects on Montreal children’s health and development, affecting everything from high school graduation rates to screen time.
The report released Monday by Montreal’s public health department found that the city’s 12-and-under population is doing well as a whole, but that there are “significant inequalities” depending on where they live and their socioeconomic status.
“We continue to observe important socioeconomic and territorial disparities,” it reads.
Researchers concluded that 67 per cent of kindergarten children living in a disadvantaged environment were considered not very active or not active at all, compared with 55 per cent for their better-off peers.
Twenty-three per cent of disadvantaged kindergarten children reportedly spent more than two hours a day looking at screens, compared with 12 per cent for those in the more “advantaged” group. Excessive screen use “is associated with various health problems in children including sleep disorders, concentration difficulties, musculoskeletal disorders and developmental risks,” …