Child obesity rates may have reached a plateau in the US after decades of almost continuous rises, says a new report.

But the finding, based on survey data gathered from 1999 to 2006 by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and published in Wednesday’s issue of The Journal of the American Medical Association, was greeted with guarded optimism.

An analysis of data from 1999 to 2006 by the US government’s Centers for Disease Control and Prevention showed obesity rates stable at 16%.

But the results have prompted speculation that a similar trend could emerge in the UK.

“That is a first encouraging finding in what has been unremittingly bad news,”

said David Ludwig, co-author of an editorial accompanying the obesity report.. “But it’s too soon to know if this really means we’re beginning to make meaningful inroads into this epidemic. It may simply be a statistical fluke.”

It is not clear if the lull in childhood weight gain is permanent or even if it is the result of public anti-obesity efforts to limit junk food and increase physical activity in schools. Doctors noted that even if the trend held up, 32 percent of American schoolchildren remained overweight or obese, representing an entire generation that will be saddled with weight-related health problems as it ages.

While the latest data suggest the obesity epidemic may have been contained, researchers say the real question is whether it is possible to reverse the obesity trend among American schoolchildren.

“We still lack anything resembling a national strategy to take this problem seriously,”

said Dr. Ludwig, “The rates of obesity in children are so hugely high that without any further increases, the impact of this epidemic will be felt with increasing severity for many years to come.”