It's
Time That We as Parents Took a Stand Against the Growing Problem
of Childhood Obesity!
The incidence of childhood obesity has risen so dramatically over the
last two decades that the International Association for the Study of
Obesity estimates that at least 155 million schoolchildren are either
overweight or obese worldwide.
Further, the annual National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey
by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that about one-third
of U.S. children are overweight or at risk of becoming overweight.
In total, about 25 million U.S. children and adolescents either are
or approaching being overweight.
Plus,
Children's Levels
of Physical Activity Have Been Trending Downward for Almost Three
Decades
On the whole, kids are spending less and less time playing outdoors
and are increasingly engaging in sedentary activities like watching television,
using a computer and playing video games.
While parents have been prying their kids away from the television for
decades, the lure of handheld gaming devices and computer technology
adds to the problem, and parents today have far more to contend with
in getting their kids to become more physically active.
The
Old Cliché About the "Good Old Days" Really
Does Apply to the Current State of Childhood Obesity
Thirty years ago, children were more likely to walk to and from school
and had far less entertainment options that discouraged physical activity
(apart from television).
In many cases, entertainment meant participating in school-sponsored
sporting events or street games such as hide-and-seek, tag, jump rope
or hopscotch that at least provided a small amount of physical effort.
Schools also had mandatory physical education requirements and recess
periods so schoolchildren had an opportunity to go outdoors and get exercise.
However, according to the National Association for Sport and Physical
Education (NASPE), during the last decade, the number of U.S. high school
students attending daily physical education classes dropped from 42 to
29 percent.
Currently, nearly half of all students and 75 percent of high school
students do not attend any physical education classes at all.
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