The topic of childhood obesity and the state of nutrition, especially among school age children, has moved from medical journals and pediatric waiting rooms to front pages of supermarket marketing campaigns and primetime television.
As it should.
Childhood obesity is one of the most serious public health challenges of the 21st century. It is a condition that affects developing and developed countries, including our own United States, particularly children in urban settings.
In 2010, the number of overweight children under the age of five is estimated to be over 42 million around the globe.
According to the Obesity Society:
In the past 30 years, the occurrence of overweight in children has doubled and it is now estimated that one in five children in the US is overweight... [and] while more children are becoming overweight, the heaviest children are getting even heavier. As a result, childhood overweight is regarded as the most common prevalent nutritional disorder of US children and adolescents, and one of the most common problems seen by pediatricians.
Childhood obesity in this country inspired British chef Jamie Oliver to launch a six-part series on ABC called Food Revolution to examine the root of the problem: a lack of nutritional education at an early age and choice of school lunches.
Books on the subject have sat on Best Seller lists for the past few years, as well: Fed Up!: Winning the War Against Childhood Obesity; Fatland: How Americans Became the Fattest People in the World; Fast Food Nation... these novels reveal the alarming numbers members of future generations are showing on the scale — and at which they're being diagnosed with complications.
And now, a group of retired military officers is joining the likes of Jamie Oliver to urge Congress to eliminate junk food and high-calorie beverages from schools and make school lunch program budgets and nutrition education in elementary and high schools a priority to aid in the development of healthier habits.
A new report by a group of retired military officers expresses concern for the future of American defense, as weight problems among potential soldiers are now the leading medical reason that recruits are rejected.
Details of the report revealed alarming figures: 27% of Americans ages 17-24 — young adults who would otherwise be eligible to join the military — are too fat to don a uniform. That number comprises 9 million of the country's youth.
National security is threatened by the increase in childhood obesity and the inability for recruits to handle the physical demand of being in the military.
Recruitment has bore the brunt of the sharp increase in our country's turning the other cheek on healthy lifestyle. The pool of able-bodied applicants for military ranks is much smaller than it was 15 years ago, and the military sustains challenges in filling its ranks.
And each year, the government shells out tens of millions of dollars for replacement training for soldiers to take the place of those discharged because of inept physical condition.
Read: weight problems.
The officers headed to the Hill to advocate their wide-ranging nutrition bill last month.
The school lunch bill would require legislation to increase spending $4.5 billion for improved nutrition programs in schools over ten years, to establish healthier options for all foods in schools, including vending machine items.
The bill currently awaits a Senate vote.
The military is no stranger to pushing for improved nutrition in national school lunch programs. Back in the 1940s, they appealed to the government for more nutritious cafeteria menus.
During World War II, it was considered a "measure of national security" to reform eating habits in schools, since many recruits suffered from and were rejected due to stunted growth and malnourishment — the opposite problem they face today.
While we wait in hope that children's health will become a national priority, it is important to promote awareness and prevention to the people who affect a child's lifestyle most: their parents.
Last year, The Trust for America's Health compiled an extensive report on obesity in America in 2009, which provides up-to-date information on disease and prevention. It details childhood obesity and cultural trends that lead to an increase in cases, as well as obesity's relationship with the economy, its effect on the baby boomer generation, and as it relates to the national health care bill and other goverment programs and policy.
The report, F as in Fat: How Obesity Policies Are Failing in America, is available here and worth a read.
Brigid
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