Potential cost savings of promoting active travel to school

This study is an effort to quantify potential cost savings of children's walking, as a form of active travel to school. The data were collected in Tehran, from a cross-sectional cohort of more than 4700 high school and middle school students. This study looks at a wide range of policy sensitive variables, such as safety and distance to school in various scenarios. The findings indicate if the safety concerns of parents associated with their children walking to school are alleviated, the direct and indirect annual costs of obesity decreases by US$719 per student. Further, a 1% decrease in the distance from home to school diminishes the annual per capita health costs associated with obesity by about US$30. However, the amount of financial savings varies among different segments of society. For instance, tackling parental safety concerns advances active travel modes, particularly among girls and high school students, while low income families experience the smallest increase in active modes.