The Pros And Cons Of Childhood Obesity

What About the Children?

When people hear the word “obesity,” they usually think about junk foods and overweight people. Although obesity does concern citizens, when does childhood obesity come to mind? Childhood obesity can be known as a “silent epidemic” (“Childhood Obesity” 1). The printed ad that is being focused on is from the French Ministry of Health. It shows a close up of an ice cream cone with pink ice cream in it. However, the pink ice cream is really in the shape of a stomach that is quite big and lumpy, as if mimicking the features of how an obese stomach would look like. Due to the high cost of healthy alternative food products and the little knowledge of calories in junk food, there is a greater risk of childhood obesity.

This ad has all ethos, pathos, and logos. Ethos would be the ice cream cone. Credibility would go straight to ice cream cones in general because almost everyone, including kids, enjoys a good ice cream.

According to an article from Harvard School of Public Health, Child Obesity, “43 million preschool children, under the age of 5, were overweigh or obese in 2010, a 60 percent increase in 1990.” Of the 43 million, 35 million live in developing countries (3). In the past three decades, childhood obesity rates have tripled in the United States. Today, the country has one of the highest obesity rates in the world. One out of six children is claimed to be obese, and one out of three children is claimed to be overweight or obese (9). In Europe, there are a number of different countries that consists of a high rate of childhood obesity, such as Spain, with a whopping 32 percent of children (16). In Latin America and the Caribbean, seven percent of children under the age of five were obese; 33 percent of children age 15 were overweight or obese. Studies were also done on Argentina and about 35 percent of children ages 10 to 11 were overweight or obese