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Childhood obesity

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sky_northern
sky_northern Posts: 119 Member
in Debate Club
"11 OCTOBER 2017 | LONDON - The number of obese children and adolescents (aged five to 19 years) worldwide has risen tenfold in the past four decades. If current trends continue, more children and adolescents will be obese than moderately or severely underweight by 2022, according to a new study led by Imperial College London and WHO."

http://www.who.int/mediacentre/news/releases/2017/increase-childhood-obesity/en/

I don't agree with this quote:
"Professor Ezzati adds: 'These worrying trends reflect the impact of food marketing and policies across the globe, with healthy nutritious foods too expensive for poor families and communities. The trend predicts a generation of children and adolescents growing up obese and at greater risk of diseases, like diabetes. We need ways to make healthy, nutritious food more available at home and school, especially in poor families and communities, and regulations and taxes to protect children from unhealthy foods.'"

The recommendations I agree with but not sure how governments can affect real change. Food culture has changes with easy access to calorie dense foods and changes in technology which means kids.
"Countries should aim particularly to reduce consumption of cheap, ultra-processed, calorie dense, nutrient poor foods. They should also reduce the time children spend on screen-based and sedentary leisure activities by promoting greater participation in physical activity through active recreation and sports."

I was an obese child, I'm not sure what would have changes my ways, I was always an active child but I liked food. Treats were limited (as in dessert and candy was for special occasions, not everyday) but we always had a lot of food around. So I have no answers. But thought it was an interesting topic for discussion.
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  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
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    Another version of the same piece from the Washington Post, which I noticed this morning: https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/childrens-obesity-rates-in-rich-countries-may-have-peaked/2017/10/10/269d329e-ae0b-11e7-9b93-b97043e57a22_story.html?utm_term=.980450103ae7
  • Kullerva
    Kullerva Posts: 1,114 Member
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    I was an overweight child (obese came later). I always had active hobbies. My parents were massively in debt and brought crap home that I had to do something with (no one cooked a meal for me after I turned 8 or so and could operate the oven, stove and microwave). I learned some not-so-healthful habits that I only unlearned in poverty, when I realized a lot of raw unprocessed foods were cheap. However...in general, the cheaper something is, the more prep it needs to be safely edible. (Dried beans are a case in point.)
  • EatingAndKnitting
    EatingAndKnitting Posts: 531 Member
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    I don't remember how much I weighed or my BMI as a child. I was never "fat" per se, as in you couldn't look at me and see rolls like some children. I was just large. I was probably overweight, but not obese. I was homeschooled, and my family was fairly poor and deeply in debt, so we didn't have a lot of money for junk food. I had a decent diet growing up. Lots of vegetables, very little snack foods (we really couldn't afford them). I ran and played a LOT outside. I probably just ate too much, but didn't really look like I did.

    It's funny when I look at children in my town when I go grocery shopping, or pick my friend's kids up from school, or see my friend's children on Facebook. I don't see a lot of overweight children. Most of them are slender and look normal to me. Their parents are often overweight, but the kids don't appear to be. I live in a town where the average income is $40,000, the college education rate is 17%, and over half of children in the school system are on the free lunch program, poverty is a real problem in this town, despite the average income being so high, we have a few outliers skewing the average.

  • wizzybeth
    wizzybeth Posts: 3,573 Member
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    When I was a kid, I was not what you would call active at all. I was lazy. I watched TV and read books and my idea of going outside to do something was to MAYBE ride my bike for 15 minutes - MAYBE - then sit under a tree by the pond with my book and fish while I read. I was not anywhere near overweight, let alone obese, even though once I hit puberty and started to fill out in certain areas (hips, butt, boobs) my father started calling me Porky. He thought it was cute, I did not - he always said I was fat - but I was not! As a teen, I was 5'6" by the time I reached high school and weighed anywhere from 118-125. Other people called me skinny, but not dear old dad. He always called me fat.

    Anyway, I had bad eating habits. I ate lots of junk food, drank lots of soda...lots of candy, Little Debbie snack cakes, pudding, desserts, treats...sugar probably made up 65% of my diet.

    This went on well into my 20s...but when I was 25 and pregnant for the first time, I naturally incorporated more nutritious food into my diet - I gained 65 lbs with my first pregnancy. I probably lost 25 lbs before I got pregnant again...and I gained another 60 lbs. Lost a little of that...then got pregnant the 3rd time and once again topped the scales at over 200 lbs. Been battling with my weight for the past 17 years now.

    By all rights, I should have been an obese child - but I wasn't. Go figure...
  • Need2Exerc1se
    Need2Exerc1se Posts: 13,576 Member
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    Ironandwine69 wrote: »
    Very rarely do you see fit parents who have obese children. I wonder why...

    True. Although my mother was overweight, maybe even obese, when I was a child yet none of her 6 children were overweight.

    It breaks my heart how many young children of my relatives and friends are very overweight or obese.
  • sky_northern
    sky_northern Posts: 119 Member
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    Ironandwine69 wrote: »
    Very rarely do you see fit parents who have obese children. I wonder why...
    Depends on on you define 'fit' but yeah, it makes sense because the habits that make parents obese easily can transfer to the children, it's what they learn.
  • Cynthia1066
    Cynthia1066 Posts: 21 Member
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    Obviously childhood obesity is concerning, but it's also important not to fat shame kids, since this sets them up for low self esteem and very tortured relationships with food later. BTW, I notice the public schools in my state are offering kids MUCH better options for lunch (unlimited raw veggie salad bars, reduced portions) but of course as long as parents send their kids to school with backpacks full of candy and chips, there's a limit what the schools can overcome...
  • Cynthia1066
    Cynthia1066 Posts: 21 Member
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    May I also point out that "fit" =/= "not overweight"? My parents weren't overweight when I was a kid, but they had unhealthy eating/drinking habits. And of course it's possible for people to carry (some) extra weight and still be fit.
  • Kullerva
    Kullerva Posts: 1,114 Member
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    Ironandwine69 wrote: »
    Very rarely do you see fit parents who have obese children. I wonder why...

    My parents were both fit (dad had a manual labor sort of job and mom was a marathoner). I was still overweight. It's not true in all cases.
  • malibu927
    malibu927 Posts: 17,565 Member
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    Ironandwine69 wrote: »
    Very rarely do you see fit parents who have obese children. I wonder why...

    Yep. My parents have always been obese and I just followed in their footsteps until I said no more.
  • CSARdiver
    CSARdiver Posts: 6,252 Member
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    Government can be very good at implementing change; however there must be a desire for the population to change. Historically there have been excellent movements enacting change but these include a wide variety of tactics, both incentives and punitive measures.

    Very troubling news, especially when reviewed alongside the increasing demand on medical care:

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/07/06/one-million-patients-week-cannot-get-gp-appointment-statistics/

    Increasing age coupled with increasing weight spells an absolute disaster.
  • mazmataz
    mazmataz Posts: 331 Member
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    My weight problems definitely started as a very young child. I remember being amused at the fact that I stood on the scale at 4 years old and weighed 4 stone (56lbs). I remember this weighing incident due to the weird reaction from my parents. They reacted in a way that I immediately understood that I was unusually big.

    My parents are and always have been really inactive and both have been quite overweight since I was born. Any outdoor activities I remember doing as a kid were all a result of me being with other relatives. I remember hating PE at school from a really young age...I was so unfit and it was crushing to be last in every race, sports day etc and not to be able to keep up with my friends when we were playing.

    My parents I guess are the typical baby boomer generation - awesome parents by all accounts, both were brought up in poverty and never had much. When they finally had some money and their own child, I guess they wanted to provide everything that they could never have. In addition, my mum has been on one diet or another since as far back as I remember - a classic yoyo dieter. I have memories of being dragged along to various slimming classes through the years. One week we were having salads for dinner every night, and then the next week it was pizza and chinese takeaway because the 'diet' was over.

    My BMI has always been around 30-32, so I've never been massive - but overweight/obese enough throughout most of my life. I was never heavily bullied at school, but enough comments were made that still stick with me. I was part of one of the more popular groups of girls at school... but I was basically the 'DUFF" of the friendship group - mates with the guys but no one every asked me out. And even though I'm an adult now, I still feel like the DUFF sometimes.

    It's a weird thing - my parents couldn't have been more loving, giving and supportive and I couldn't have asked for better parents really. However their kindness and own views towards food and exercise have contributed towards my own negative self-image that I have been trying to undo for as long as I've been aware of it - and it really has had a massive impact on my life. Being a parent must be so friggin difficult!
  • mazmataz
    mazmataz Posts: 331 Member
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    YepItsKriss wrote: »

    It becomes a snowballed effect.. Cost of living, busy parents trying to make money to offset the cost of living and technology making it easier for people to stay at home and connect then go out to make those connections and a lack of education and understanding about the role of calorie consumption, inactivity and what is appropriate for growing children.

    I agree with the first part of this but not the second. It's been said before but it is true - our parent's generation had no idea what a calorie even was, they ate a lot of food that we would deem 'unhealthy' by today's standards (fried foods cooked in lard, white bread, real butter etc) and for the most part their generation didn't have a weight problem.


  • Need2Exerc1se
    Need2Exerc1se Posts: 13,576 Member
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    mazmataz wrote: »
    It's a weird thing - my parents couldn't have been more loving, giving and supportive and I couldn't have asked for better parents really. However their kindness and own views towards food and exercise have contributed towards my own negative self-image that I have been trying to undo for as long as I've been aware of it - and it really has had a massive impact on my life. Being a parent must be so friggin difficult!

    Ain't that the truth!!

    I was born in the 60's when almost everyone was thin. My mother was not. She did all the things I see people on MFP complain about parents doing - constantly trying to lose weight, telling her children they'd get fat if they ate too much while she herself was eating too much, telling us not to eat too much junk food.

    Yet none of us were overweight as children or teenagers. I suspect this has more to do with the time in which we were young than anything else. This was a time before video games, when there were only 3 TV channels and homes in our income level (middle class) had only one TV. A time when parents threw you out of the house and said "be home in time for dinner" and you were on your own until then.

    We are all old enough to be grandparents now but only one of my siblings has ever been obese, though several of us have been overweight at times.
  • ninerbuff
    ninerbuff Posts: 48,535 Member
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    My viewpoint is from experiencing dealing with fat kids as well as seeing what kids do at lunch time everyday.

    As a trainer, when a parent brings their kid in with the hope that they will lose weight, I let the parent know that my job with the kid is to improve their physical health and output. I can't do much with their eating because I'm not the one providing the food at home and can only offer advice on how many calories the kid needs to eat to lose weight.

    As a yard duty at a middle school, many kids bring lunch, but A LOT of kids buy lunch. And since we're in a technology era of credit, all parents have to do is link their bank account to the kids lunch credit. And these kids who buy lunch, buy A LOT of food along with cookies and chips.
    Kids who bring lunch do a little better, but it's not uncommon for a lot of them to throw away "good" parts of their lunch. The other day I say a perfectly good homemade salad get tossed immediately by a kid.

    But obese kids LEARN their eating habits from home. And since I pick up and drop off my kid everyday from school, I can clearly see that obese kids usually have obese siblings and parents. The kids are only following what they have learned at home.

    A.C.E. Certified Personal and Group Fitness Trainer
    IDEA Fitness member
    Kickboxing Certified Instructor
    Been in fitness for 30 years and have studied kinesiology and nutrition
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