The Growing Epidemic of Childhood Obesity
Children born today are more than three times likely to be obese than they were in 1980. Nationally, 19.6% of children between the ages of six and eleven are obese, compared to 6.5% in 1980. In Western Tidewater, an even greater proportion of children suffer from obesity - 25% and 63% (2 out of 3) of the adults in the region are overweight or obese.
Carrying excess weight puts children and adults at greater risk for poor and costly health outcomes. Compared to children with a healthy weight, risk factors for conditions such as heart disease, high blood pressure, and type 2 diabetes increases tremendously in children who are overweight or obese. Those children who are overweight or obese at a young age are more likely to become or remain obese as adults, without proper intervention. Unless, the trend of childhood obesity is reversed, today's youth would be the first generation since the civil-war to have a shorter life expectancy than their parents.
National Center for Chronic Disease and Health Promotion. Healthy Youth!: Childhood Obesity. Retrieved from http://www.cdc.gov/HealthyYouth/obesity/, [Accessed January 4, 2011].
Chronic Disease in Western Tidewater Health District, 2010
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The surgeon general's call to action to prevent and decrease overweight and obesity: Overweight in children and adolescents. Retrieved from http://www.surgeongeneral.gov/topics/obesity/calltoaction/fact_adolescents.html, [Accessed January 4, 2011].