X

We detected that you're visiting our site from the UK. Would you like to visit the ChaCha UK website?

Childhood Obesity

Childhood Obesity

Obesity is the result of a caloric imbalance. Too many calories, not enough calories burned. It is mediated by genetic, behavioral and environmental factors. Obese youth are more likely to be at risk for heart disease, diabetes, bone and joint problems, sleep apnea, social and psychological problems such as stigmatization and poor self-esteem, heart disease, stroke, several types of cancer, and osteoarthritis.

About Childhood Obesity

Childhood obesity is a major problem in the U.S. In early 2010 the First Lady Michelle Obama announced a program to combat an epidemic of childhood obesity called Let's Move. Several factors can contribute to childhood obesity, according to the National Institute of Health:

*A genetic predisposition or family history of obesity.
*Not getting enough exercise.
*Eating unhealthy foods.
*Rarely, a health condition such as an endocrine disorder

An April 9, 2010 article in HealthDay News reported the following:

In the past 35 years, the percentage of overweight or obese children in one Louisiana town has more than tripled, new research shows. In the early 70s, fewer than one in six children (14.2 percent) in the town of Bogalusa was overweight or obese. By 2008-2009, almost half of the town's children and teens (48.4 percent) fell into those categories, according to a study in the April issue of Pediatrics.

The startling findings come on the heels of a more encouraging study, published in January in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), that found overweight and obesity rates across the United States appeared to finally be leveling off at 16.9 percent.

'These findings show that we still have a long way to go as a nation to get where we need to be with childhood obesity,' said study author Stephanie Broyles, an assistant professor and epidemiologist at the Pennington Biomedical Research Center at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge.

Recent Childhood Obesity Questions

PREV 1 2 3 4 5 NEXT
85 Answers
Advertisement
›
›
›
Childhood Obesity