There is a lot of evidence that the
epidemic of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder in the developed world is
an increasing problem, and that it may be caused by overstimulation of
children, especially by exposure to ‘rapidly paced television programmes’. These children become impulsive, do
poorly at school, and are later on they are far more likely to have car
crashes, get divorced, and go to prison.
And all of us in the developed world are
now bombarded with input from TV, emails, texts, and social media. We have to
tune out deliberately in order to get on with anything!
This seems to be one problem that we do not
have in rural Zambia. Most
children here have no TV, no computers, no toys, no bikes, no mobile phones, no
books, and no electricity for reading even if they had something to read. They
lack even simple footballs – so they have to make them out of bits of plastic and
tape and plastic bags. So going for a walk or bike ride through a rural village means dealing
with a crowd of kids all keen to hold your hand and walk along with you as you
are probably the most novel and interesting event of their day.
So we need more footballs in Zambia, and
less TV in the UK. But how?
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