Children find the key to happier and healthier lives

Jun 17 2008 by Simon Rushworth, The Journal

It is a landmark scheme which has touched the lives of 60,000 children across the North East and now a groundbreaking health programme has been rolled out nationally. Former Journal Chief Sports Writer Simon Rushworth reports on a sporting success story.

IN 2002 an ambitious team of community coaches set about persuading a generation of children that healthier lifestyles would lead to long-term happiness and offset the myriad fitness problems which had dogged their parents and grandparents.

Using basketball as their tool, and supported by the North East’s only professional franchise, Newcastle Eagles, those same coaches made sure a handful of impressionable youngsters became the first to experience the benefits of Hoops4Health.

Six years down the line and more than 60,000 pupils from across the region have experienced a life-changing scheme which has proved beyond doubt the power of sport as an effective method of boosting health.

This year saw Hoops4Health rolled out nationally with each of the British Basketball League’s 12 clubs running tournaments, culminating in a Champion of Champions event at Birmingham’s National Indoor Arena in May.

It is estimated that 500,000 children from across the UK will reap tangible rewards from the programme by the time the London Olympics begins in 2012, with local authorities across the country recognising the value of health education through basketball.

Dr Danny Ruta, public health director for Newcastle Primary Care Trust, said: “It’s an extraordinary achievement to get so many children engaged in physical activity. Without Hoops4Health, many of them wouldn’t have had the chance to engage in any kind of physical activity. And many of them will be children who have been turned off by, or turned away from, so-called majority sports.

“It just shows what can be done to improve children’s health by basing a grassroots, community-based programme around sport. Some of the bigger sports around Newcastle should probably take note.”

Dr Ruta’s last point is a valid one and if Newcastle Eagles, through basketball, are blazing a trail for healthier lifestyles, then sporting rivals are lagging behind.

If Fabulous Flournoy, the club’s award-winning player-coach, and his team of minor personalities can impact so greatly upon children born into a football-obsessed community, then imagine the potential for success should Newcastle United or Sunderland commit to similar schemes.

For now basketball is the blueprint and Dr Ruta added: “Through Hoops4Health the sheer number of children who are now expending more calories than they would have done is incredible.

“The programme has potentially done more to improve the health of children in the North East, and increase life expectancy through regular exercise, than many other conventional medical interventions.”

The Eagles are justifiably proud of a scheme which has dovetailed perfectly with the franchise’s emergence as the most powerful basketball club in Britain.

On the court Newcastle have claimed eight trophies in four years and off it no professional sports organisation in the North East has demonstrated a greater commitment to the community.

Eagles managing director Paul Blake said: “Since the inception of the Hoops4Health programme, the project has moved from strength to strength in this region. The healthy living messages relayed by the Eagles players and the community team have clearly made a difference during the past six years.

“Hoops for Health has also under- pinned our growing junior basketball development structure. In 2001 there were no junior clubs playing basketball in Tyne and Wear and consequently no junior leagues.

“As a result of the Hoops4Health project there are now more than 20 junior clubs operating for 10 to 20-year-olds across Tyne and Wear and south east Northumberland.

“It is now possible, when we receive a call from an anxious parent whose child wants to join a club, to point them to a set-up not far from their doorstep, which has been the key aim of the scheme from day one.”

Basketball will never challenge football’s position as the pre-eminent sport in the North East but as a weapon in the fight to combat obesity and ill-health it has more than proved its worth.

Even children with no prior knowledge of a sport synonymous with the region for more than three decades are attracted to a game where fashion and culture sit comfortably alongside fitness as key elements.

Fusing larger-than-life personalities with subtle lifestyle messages, it is hardly surprising that Hoops4Health has become the catalyst for several offshoot schemes and Lean East, an initiative to tackle obesity issues in one of Tyneside’s most deprived areas, is a prime example.

Last summer Eagles Community Foundation coach Marc Steutel, a promising player with Team Northumbria, took the project into 10 primary schools across the East End of Newcastle for the first time. At the scheme’s conclusion earlier this year, scores of pupils had benefited from targeted health advice.

“Lean East is a unique scheme born out of Hoops4Health,” said Steutel. “There are various service providers working together, backed by Government funding, to tackle the problem of overweight and obese kids. We’re all trying to solve what is a massive problem and basketball is just one part of it. I do feel we’re having a positive effect on a community with one or two problems.”

For Dr Ruta and fellow health professionals across the North East, there is no doubt that basketball has been a boon to a region traditionally fighting a losing battle in its bid to encourage physical activity.

“Even if we can prevent one kid from developing problems in later life, we’ve made a difference,” admitted New Yorker Flournoy.

“Fitness can be fun and anyone can pick up a basketball and shoot some hoops. For some it could be the start of a whole new life and a longer life.”