Obesity in children and adolescents: An expanding problem

Spend the summer teaching your children healthy lifestyle habits – habits they can use into adulthood. Sadly, many children in this country aren’t getting the nutrition or exercise they need to grow into healthy, active adults. Read through the tips below to start on the path to good health. Many of these tips take only a few moments each day and can make a world of difference.

Strategies to help keep you and your family healthy this summer:

• Offer water as the best thirst quencher. Limit availability of sugar-sweetened drinks. Provide milk at meals.
• Serve portion sizes appropriate for each age.
• Avoid super-size meals and drinks. Avoid all-you-can-eat buffets. Share restaurant meals or ask for a take home container.
• Help children learn to eat when hungry and stop when full.
• Establish physical activity as routine part of everyday life for all family members.
• Plan special weekend activities.
• Use public parks, recreational areas or ballfields for physical activities.
• Support participation in non-competitive and competitive activities.
• Support physician activity programs for children and youth with special needs.
• Avoid having a TV set in your children’s bedrooms.
• Help children prioritize programs they watch.
• Teach children to critique TV advertising.
• Encourage play as alternative to TV/video games.
• Be a positive role model for your children.
  
  

Alarming statistics on childhood obesity in this country:

• Obesity affects one in five children in the United States.
• The prevalence of childhood obesity has doubled in the past two decades and tripled in adolescents.
• Overweight children become overweight adults and can have significant health problems associated with obesity. Over 60 percent of adults are overweight.
• Preventable deaths from obesity exceed 300,000 per year.
• The economic burden of obesity in the U.S. is approximately $120 billion.
• Complications of obesity include high blood pressure, hardening of the arteries, type 2 diabetes, sleep apnea, leg deformities and fractures, polycystic ovary disease, and low self-esteem and depression.
• Factors that increase our waistlines include: increased number of meals away from home, larger portion sizes, consumption of more snack foods, and sugar-sweetened drinks. Also, children and teens do not get the physical exercise they need, and spend extended amounts of time in front of a TV or computer.
• Only 20 percent of children and adolescents consume 5 or more servings of fruit and vegetables per day.
• Fast food consumption makes up 35 to 40 percent of an average family’s food budget.
• Soft drinks account for 13 percent of an average child’s caloric intake. In fact, soda has become the choice of a new generation. One-third of teenage boys consume at least three 12-ounce servings of soft drinks daily. Soft drinks can contribute to weight gain and Type 2 diabetes.
• Teenagers today drink twice as much soda as milk. Only 19 percent of girls 9 -19 years meet the recommended intake for calcium.
• Only 50 percent of teenagers in the U.S. regularly participate in rigorous physical activity. Twenty-five percent report no activity.
• The average child watches 3 hours of television per day. This does not include videotapes or video or computer games.
• Over 30 percent of 2 to 7 year-olds and 65 percent of 8 to 18 year-olds have a TV set in their bedrooms.