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Childhood obesity: causes and solutions
How to prevent childhood obesity essay
Childhood obesity: causes and solutions
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Educating children in childhood and adolescence will promote childhood healthy growth and also intellectual development. Therefore, starting health programs at school will help children and their parents to obtain education and reinforcement for healthy body and healthy mind. Montgomery county School Health Council states that since 2011 obesity prevention is a priority and therefore they adopted new menu for school lunches and physical education requirements. Here is one of the examples of programs that were adopted “School Health Services: obesity prevention school-based program called Healthy Choices, Happy Students which includes Nutrition Nuggets, an afternoon nutrition information program (in collaboration with the University of Maryland
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) discuss about childhood obesity. With CDC, this research is very useful in helping others understand what overweight and obesity is. Having excess body weight for a particular height from fat, bone, muscle, water, or a combination of all is being overweight. Obesity is just having excess body fat. It states about obesity occurring to children and adolescents that has passed since 30 years. The first stage of this phenomenon starts as a person being overweight which will lead to obesity. More than one-third of children and adolescents were overweight or obese. The result for both of these terms is a caloric-imbalance which is an amount of too few calories that is consumed and is affected by many genetics, behavioral, and environmental factors. From this source CDC gives a specific estimate percentage of children aged 6–11 years that is more overly obese. In the United States in 1980 who were obese increased from 7% to nearly 18% in 2012. Furthermore over the same period, the percentage of adolescents aged 12–19 years who were obese increased from 5% to nearly 21%. Additionally, there is a list of health effects of childhood obesity and inform immediate and long-term health effects. Tips are also included here to prevent any other health problems relating to obesity. It does not clearly teach every step of how to prevent it, but giving out ideas on how to solve the problem yourself.
From Kindergarten to 12th grade, children spend most of their time at school. School, what we adults think, is supposed to be the teachers of our children while we are at work. They feed them lunch, and possibly breakfast, five days out the week, keep them active, and teach them all about their body and health in health class. But, are they really taking care of them enough? Some schools fail to serve healthy foods, teach health class, or even provide enough time to be physically active. One in three kids are obese, that is reason enough to care about these children’s lives at school. Schools are one of the reasons that the younger generation has a fast growing obese rate.
Schools are meant to give our children a healthy and nurturing environment, and yet so much of the lunches in schools are fattening; does this stop schools from achieving the aforementioned goal? Childhood obesity in the United Sates continues to be a growing problem despite so any new programs to help combat it, and new research is showing how schools may be playing a large role in childhood obesity. School lunches are showing to be the problem, they encourage poor nutrition in our nation’s students, and simple reform is proving to not be enough to stop the rise in obesity rates.
...ars of school. Once kids eat their lunches they normally want to go run around and use some of that energy from the food so they can concentrate better in class. It is also a good thing to require because school gym is the only exercise most teens and children get throughout the day. It helps cut the growing rate of diabetes and obesity. Sports are also a good way to stay active and healthy. Not only are you constantly moving and getting tons of exercise, but sports teams normally offer a good healthy snack after games such as peanut butter crackers and juice boxes or nutrition bars and bottled water. It all makes a huge difference in the development of children and teens. If we take these small steps to change, we can easily redirect the lives of children and teens health. Having more nutritious lunches can have a positive impact on the health of American teens.
Obesity has become an epidemic in adults and children in the United States. Moreover, children are at risk of obesity because they do not eat enough fruits and vegetables and do not obtain enough physical activity. Also, children have a higher chance of developing health diseases related to obesity such as hypertension, high cholesterol, stroke, heart disease, diabetes and pulmonary disease. In addition, obesity in children from ages one to seventeen is an issue in Texas, since children are not aware of the serious consequences of being obese. Therefore, Texas should find ways to prevent obesity by authorizing healthier school lunches and allowing a school program to help obese children lose weight. Also, television advertisements are influencing obese children to make unhealthy choices.
There is still a troubling growing paradox in hungry children and childhood obesity. Children are either getting too many or too little calories. NSLP is still criticized to this day, nonetheless they made a tremendous improvement to the program since publication of Fast Food Nation in 2001. The NSLP only provides student with 1 to 2 meals out of the day. It is up to the parents to teach and provide their children with nutritional food,“HEALTHY eating and physical activity habits are key to your child 's well-being. Eating too much and exercising too little can lead to overweight and related health problems that can follow children into their adult years. You can take an active role in helping your child--and your whole family--learn healthy eating and physical activity habits that can last for a lifetime.”(National Institute of Diabetes & Digestive & Kidney Diseases). By teaching and encouraging healthy eating habits, Offer healthy food options at home and Limiting fast food and junk food. It is also important to Limit your child’s time using a TV, computer, cell phone, or game station and encourage them to participate in physical activity. A great way to do this is to sign your children up for sports. Fast Food Nation started the discussion of America’s Food epidemic, yet sadly fifteen years has later
Poor nutritional habits have been identified as one of many contributing factors to the increase in childhood obesity. While a multi-disciplinary approach involving family, teachers, medical care providers and the community is desirable, schools, particularly teachers, are in a unique position to play a major role in the education of children and adolescents about nutrition and the prevention of obesity. “Schools are important settings to implement prevention and intervention due to their access, duration of exposure, and subsequent impact on the behavior of children and adolescents” (Pyle, Sharkey, Yetter, Felix, Furlong, & Poston, 2006, p. 372). The challenge of schools, then, is to design and effectively implement a successful curriculum incorporating traditional lecture style, core information with the learning styles and technology skills of today’s 21st century learners, the Net Generation.
This issue of childhood obesity is growing out of control. There havev been many efforts to increase awareness in order to help children become more fit. Success for these attempts have not been too successful. Many children who get on a diet do not complete it. As a result, they do not reach their expected weight loss goal. Childhood obesity is dangerous because there are a lot of potential complications that can be faced if it is not handled. Becoming obese during childhood can result in obesity later on; it can also impact the quality of the child’s life; and children also become more susceptible to diseases later on. Due to the statistics that are shown for the growing rate of childhood obesity, it is wondered if childhood obesity is a result of parental neglect. The current debate is what can be done to help childhood obesity. If indeed it is a result of parental neglect, what can be done to get parents in check to control this ongoing epidemic?
Childhood obesity is a serious problem among American children. Some doctors are even calling childhood obesity an epidemic because of the large percentage of children being diagnosed each year as either overweight or obese. “According to DASH sixteen to thirty-three percent of American children each year is being told they are obese.” (Childhood Obesity) There is only a small percentage, approximately one percent, of those children who are obese due to physical or health related issues; although, a condition that is this serious, like obesity, could have been prevented. With close monitoring and choosing a healthier lifestyle there would be no reason to have such a high obesity rate in the United States (Caryn). Unfortunately, for these children that are now considered to be obese, they could possibly be facing some serious health conditions, such as heart disease, diabetes, and some types of cancers. All of these diseases have been linked to obesity through research. These children never asked for this to happen to them; however, it has happened, and now they will either live their entire life being obese, or they will be forced to reverse what has already been done (Childhood Obesity).
Many schools in America face the problem of their students being obese. Schools can help by educating their students on portion size and introduce them to healthier options. They can also modify their exercise requirement and keep in contact with families.
Michelle Obama once said, “Kids who participate in school meal programs get roughly half of their calories each day at school… This is an extraordinary responsibility. But it’s also an opportunity. And it’s why one of the single most important things we can do to fight childhood obesity is to make those meals at school as healthy and nutritious as possible.” As evidenced by First Lady Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move campaign, childhood obesity, the improving of poor diets, promoting physical activity, and advancing the nutritional education of children are all at the forefront of childhood issues to mobilize around.
The amount of people with obesity has multiplied since the 1970s. ¨the percentage of children with obesity in the united states has more than tripled since the 1970s. Today about one in five school-aged children has obesity¨ (¨Childhood¨). School lunches need to be more healthier to help the rate of obesity, of school-aged kids, decrease. The amount of calories a day a child should consume is about 2,200 calories, which is just about two times larger than an average school lunch. ¨The average school lunch has about 900 calories, which is about half of the amount of total calories a child should consume daily. Many schools attempt to serve healthy lunches for students, but sometimes they are not aware of what ¨healthy¨ is¨ (¨Childhood¨). Schools do not have enough nutrients in their lunches to be known as a healthy lunch. ¨Nutrition is important, it helps our bodies and brains grow and develop into the way that they are supposed to, Schools claim that they offer the nutrients in foods, but according to an online study 15 percent of 13-15 year old girls are obese and 14 percent of 13-15 year old boys are obese and schools can be at blame for that¨ (¨Reduce¨). Schools should take action on making sure that their students get a healthy lunch while at school, and that is free from trans and saturated
Modification of policy is needed with more agencies supervision to ensure that the policy on healthy diet and physical activities is being followed in the school setting by providing healthy food to the school children and annual school health screening is being carried out properly as mandated. Health and wellness are very important in the school setting with the involvement of school children to participate in the physical education throughout the school year. According to Beaudette (2014), between 2012-13, over 1.6 million students attended public school which is a great opportunity to integrate the school program with health and wellness content and understandings to the children throughout the school period (Physical activities and nutrition toolkit for Georgia public schools and school district, 2017. However, it is important to educate all parents about healthy diet and physical exercise for their children as well as themselves and the resources needed that are available to them the communities and the schools must maintain the checks and balances for the proposed policy
Obesity is a worldwide epidemic that is quickly becoming worse. Going by the government initiative the pyramid of the four tiers of obesity care, population-wide intervention is the largest section that is associated with the prevention of obesity. As the NHS spend over £5 billion per year on the treatment of obesity it is thought that preventing obesity is the most cost effective way of treating obesity. There are many campaigns to help individuals have a healthier diet which are Change4Life, 5-a-day and the eat well plate (Robinson and Border, 2015). Globally to reduce the prevalence of adult obesity childhood obesity needs to be prevented. Population-based obesity prevention are divided into three broad components structures, which are "Structures within government to support childhood obesity prevention policies and interventions, Population-wide policies and initiatives and Community-based interventions (Royal School of Physicians, 2013)”.
Educational institutions have the potential to, first and foremost, educate and assist the young people of today with making the positive, healthful choices necessary to maintain good health. Over 4,500 students have been followed in recent research studies and these “thousands of sixth graders who participated in a school-based health program were less obese by eighth grade than a group of similar children who did not, according to a new study done for the National Institutes of Health” (Rabin). Schools need to create health programs focused on assisting all children suffering from being overweight or obese. Policies such as fitness programs, nutrition classes, and healthful meals can even impact every student by creating a strong foundation and awareness of the negative, long term effects associated with practicing unhealthy habits. Although the financial expenses would be necessary, the adaption of scho...