Over half of UK kids not meeting daily recommended exercise

A study by Sport England has shown that more than eleven million adults are doing less than thirty minutes of exercise in a week, and 53% of children and young people are not meeting the government’s recommended guideline of 60 minutes of activity a day, classing them as “inactive”. A further study by The UK’s premier basketball team, the London Lions, showed that 73% of Brits believe that cities are forgetting about children, becoming congested and running out of space for kids to play. Where Sport England have announced they are redirecting £250 million towards deprived areas with the worst levels of physical inactivity over the next five years, the London Lions are also playing their part in helping to get Britain moving more.

Targeting inactivity in deprived areas, Sport England has announced “one of the biggest shake-ups of funding in decades”, with £250m redirected towards these deprived areas. In terms of participation, Basketball is second only to Football, and with 33% of basketball participants being from the most deprived population quartile, the second highest rate of any sport in the UK, Basketball could be the answer to encourage more young people in deprived areas to exercise, as more than one million children and young people already play basketball on a regular basis.

The London Lions are at the forefront of this issue in London, encouraging young people and those in deprived areas to play basketball through their community projects, such as basketball summer camps, which gives an opportunity for eight to sixteen year-olds to play and train with the Lions on their state-of-the-art court in Stratford, and the Court Renovation project, where the London Lions have partnered with Serpentine Galleries and Tower Hamlets Council to create a unique basketball court, which will be a vibrant community hub aiming to get people active and playing basketball. With Sport England working hard to increase activity in young people, initiatives by other organisations, such as the London Lions, is also vital to this drive, and will help in the government’s aim to get an additional 3.5 million people physically active by 2030, including one million children.