Increasing Rate of Obesity in Children

INCREASING RATE OF OBESITY IN CHILDREN

by

Ashley

English Comp I

Professor Furr

02 December 2012

Childhood obesity in America is a growing epidemic. Most would claim they know it is a problem in our country, yet every year there is an increase in the amount of obese children in the United States. The medical, physical, and psychological effects associated with obesity are astounding; nevertheless, processed, high calorie, low nutrient food is widely available and consumed on a regular basis by children. Parents, childcare providers, schools, and the community all need to aid in the cure and prevention of childhood obesity by providing healthy, nutritious food for children and encouraging daily exercise.

With childhood obesity increasing very steadily, it is helpful to many who aren't familiar with this topic to know the causes of childhood obesity.

A. Parental influence is a contributing cause of obesity in children; the habits of many parents affect their children's choices and ways of life.

Parents are in control of enforcing and encouraging beneficial rules for their children. They should encourage exercising, and healthy food choices, and socializing with people.

Parents directly influence the types and amounts of foods that they offer their children, the amount of time children are left unsupervised and eating experiences in social situations can all influence how likely a child is to be overweight, according to the Department of Health & Human Services.

One of the primary reasons for obesity in children is their eating habits, they are eating empty calories instead of having healthy fruits and vegetables. Children are more inclined to have, processed snacks, fried foods, burgers, pizzas and many other foods in this similar category.

Another contributing cause of obesity is the amount of social interaction with other children. In the past years children used to play with other children in the neighborhood. Today in our society children stay inside. There are many reasons that this is the case, for example neighborhood and parks are no longer safe environments for children.

Television and media play a key role in the obesity problem as because they are influenced by the enticing advertisements for unhealthy snacks they are bombarded with while watching TV, these issues can start in childhood and last through adulthood.

It is not good for children to sit inside, being inactive during the day and watch TV. Often times while watching TV they will munch on a bag of potato chips. We all know that chips are full of empty calories and consuming these combined with inactivity will cause the child to most likely gain weight. It does not, however, help the fact that most of the commercials produced today are persuading the children to eat and buy unhealthy foods.

Children today spend as much as four and a half hours each day watching television and are influenced by the programming and advertising they see. In 2010, one out of every three American children is obese or overweight. As childhood obesity rises, there is an opportunity for the FCC to examine the impact of the media and children's television programming on this growing health concern.

Some sources say that the lack of physical activities in schools is a threat to diabetes in children.

There are some alarming statistics stating that most of the American adolescents do not meet the 2008 Physical Activity Guidelines. Recommendations of at least 60 minutes of aerobic physical activity each day, as only 18 % of students in grades 9 - 12 met this recommendation in 2007.

The facts clearly state that children are not engaging in enough exercise in school or at home. In some schools physical education is not offered during the school day. Some children hardly participate in neighborhood activities like skating, skipping, running races etc. They spend their time doing stationary activities, such as using the computer, playing video games or watching television. It is a proven that children who watch the most hours of television have the highest incidence of obesity. When children are physically inactive, most of the unused energy in the body is stored as fat.

An important factor determining obesity is peer pressure, this is an unhealthy cause for obesity in children or adolescents as it not only affect them physically but also emotionally.

Childhood obesity rates have climbed at increasing rates year after year to the point that nearly half of the kids in a given classroom today are living above their healthy weight range. It's almost tough to say what an "average" weight for a child at a given age and height due to the increasing number of kids that are overweight.

We all know that growing children are especially sensitive to personal appearance, often affecting their self-esteem and confidence; children seem to be a little harsher than adults when it comes to perception of looks. Today children that are overweight have the tendency to feel low about their selves and feel the peer pressure to be thin. Often times these unrealistic body images can cause grief and heart ache. The heartache comes from peers that tease these overweight children causing them to feel unwanted, abandoned and lonely, all due to poor food choices, bad genetics and lack of activity. In most cases this is preventable and treatable.

Obesity has a lot to do with food intake and dieting.

Meal portion sizes in restaurants have more than doubled over the past 2 decades. A lot of fast food restaurants offer up to 20 % larger portion sizes for a minimal additional cost, adding hundreds of extra calories to a meal.

Today our schools are stocked with convenience foods and often times offer snack bars and other food venders that contend with USDA's school lunch program offerings. Aside from competing with USDA's lunch program offerings, these foods are just like the ones sold in vending machines because they also pose both health and diet risks towards school-aged children. Clinical lecturer of internal medicine at the U-M Medical School and lead study author, Madhuri Kakarala, M.D., Ph.D. says, "The foods that children are exposed to early on in life influence the pattern for their eating habits as adults."

Childhood obesity comes with many health risks. Some of the risk factors discussed