Upon the release of The Whitehouse Taskforce on Childhood Obesity’s report, First Lady Michelle Obama stated, “For the first time, the nation will have goals, benchmarks and measureable outcomes that will help us tackle the childhood obesity epidemic one child, one family and one community at a time.”Given the fact that over the past quarter century the obesity rate for children has doubled (and tripled for adolescents), it’s critical to treat this issue as the serious epidemic it has become. The long term risks to our youth are significant given that obese young people are more likely than children of normal weight to become overweight or obese adults, and therefore more at risk for associated adult health problems, including heart disease, type 2 diabetes, stroke, several types of cancer and osteoarthritis. Additionally, obese children are at greater risk for bone and joint problems, sleep apnea, and social and psychological problems such as stigmatization and poor self-esteem.
So why has youth obesity become a major epidemic? While we can debate the influence of a multitude of contributing factors, we can clearly isolate two key issues:
· Poor Nutritional Choices: This is the “supersize” generation, consuming large portion sizes of high fat, high sugar foods and beverages.
· Limited Physical Activity: Kids today simply aren’t using their bodies like children of previous generations. Video games, technology and general conveniences of modern day life make spontaneous physical activity less likely for our current (and future) generation of youth. In his book, Getting Physical, Art Turock writes, “If when we were born, our bodies came with an owners manual, its basic message would be three words long, and that message would be, ‘use it regularly.’” In other words our bodies are made to be used—the more we use it, the better it functions, the less we use it, the more likely it will malfunction.
To blame our children for these habits would be to side-step our own responsibility. We know that environmental factors are key to the habits (good and bad) that we develop. As a society we’ve essentially said its okay for companies to target kids with their high fat, high sugar products. We’ve created urban environments with little or no green space and sidewalks. We’ve allowed our schools to limit or totally cut physical education while serving high fat foods in the school cafeteria.
In order to right some of these wrongs, the Task Force, under First Lady Obama’s leadership, has made important recommendations that if adopted, will help to reverse this alarming trend. The ultimate goal of the plan is to reduce the incidence of childhood obesity from the current 32 percent to a rate of 5 percent within one generation (for more information, visit letsmove.gov)
The Y of Central Maryland will continue to provide a wide variety of ways to help children and their families enjoy the benefits of a healthy active lifestyle: from parent/child programs to specially designed youth fitness classes; from swim lessons and sports programming to fun, traditional camping activities. Visit our website or ask one of staff for more detail on the dozens of opportunities to help Central Maryland accomplish the First Lady’s goals—Today!
Posted by Bob Brosmer, Chief Operating Officer, Y of Central Maryland
