Overweight and Obesity: the New Endemic Diseases Essay

Obesity and being overweight are very common worldwide issues around the world, especially in the U.S. There are more than 3 million cases per year. By changing your lifestyle such as diet and exercise, losing weight can seem effortless. Desirable junk/fast food or even irresistible fast food commercials can tempt you to do the unthinkable. We are all victims of this advertising war. Quick-service restaurants (QSR) generate these advertisements in hope to attract more consumers or to increase their popularity rates around town. These commercials bombard our state of mind only to convince us to buy unhealthy food for worthless money. The increase in fast food commercials in the U.S. has led to an increase in both QSR revenues and the obesity rates. Regulating commercial frequencies will lead to a decline in the obesity rate. Our country has more than enough issues that frequently affect our population. Despite these alarming cautions, the food industries with their advertiser use every available media outlet to promote and sell their products. Pushing food and drinks high in sugar is unethical and unjust. We learn to

Parents should shape their children eating habit, by giving them healthy food such as vegetable, and fruit. Parents should prevent their children to have access to junk food, and decrease kids’ food preference. Parents can also encourage their kids to walk to and from school if the school is not too far. Parents should cut off TV time for their kids to two hours a day. Moderate physical activity is very important for children to maintain healthy weight. Kids should be encourage to exercise at 30 minutes a day. This should be done at school since children spend most of their day time at school. Another action that needs to be taken to reduce childhood obesity is food regulation at elementary schools. Government should remove vending machines from all elementary school because these foods contain high calories. The price of low calories food should be reduced to encourage children to eat healthy.

On a smaller scale, a change ought to occur in communities in which the children live and attend school in order to provide an environment that makes healthy choices readily available. Parents as well as schools largely contribute to this epidemic. Schools contribute to obesity, and need to approach this matter face first. (1) Physical education programs are limited, which is distributing considering only 3.8% of elementary schools, 7.9% of middle schools and 2.1 percent of high schools actually provide their students with physical education. Curriculum needs to be utilized in order to educate and empower students of the importance of nutrition and physical activity. For change to occur everyone has to be on board, particularly parents. Parents cannot just tell children what and whatnot to do; they need to allow children to participate in planning and of activities, in order to be successful. Children like to feel as if they are an active participant and to take part in the decision-making process, thus the parent ought to provide them with instrumental support. Parents and school systems are strong advocates and need to implement change to receive positive results; there are various effective methods of doing this. Children spend most of their time in school and at home, subsequently education should occur about of nutrition’s and

Childhood obesity is a rather new reality in the United States due to intake of sugary snacks and beverages, childhood obesity is the result of a sustained energy imbalance. Most youth never eat the required daily servings of fruits and vegetables; its noted only one in five eat the required servings (21%) (Moore, Wilke, & Desrochers, 2017). The availability of sugary snacks and beverages in schools are what one would call “junk food”. According to a study conducted by Ashlesha Datar and Nancy Nicosia (2012) students could purchase more than one single food and beverage items either

Over time America has become bigger. Not just in population size, but also in pant size. Obesity has been on the rise and children are now being affected at an alarming rate. Obesity can be defined as having an unhealthy amount of body fat. The rise of childhood obesity can be linked to bad diets, family, and a lack of exercise. Being obese as a child can cause serious consequences later in life. Bad diets are a major cause of obesity, especially in youth. Consuming unhealthy food often is linked to weight gain. Food that is high in fat, sugar, and calories are the staples of an unhealthy diet. Fast food has all three. According to studies “adolescents associate junk food with pleasure, independence, and convenience” (Sahoo Par 12). Fast food

According to an article, “Obesity in Children”, published through the medicine health website, the issue on childhood obesity in the United States has increased within recent years. “Today, nearly a third of youths are overweight or obese. That’s more than 23 million children and teenagers,” (Childhood Obesity in the United States). Obesity can eventually lead to different and more serious health issues. Fast food restaurants attract the attention of our younger generation and are some of the main causes of obesity today. This has become a huge issue to Americans, but especially to the youth. With that being said, my goal in this paper is to show how rapidly obesity is increasing in children in the United States.

A tool known as BMI (body mass index) is used by medical providers to calculate an individual 's body mass index. It calculated by measuring a child’s weight and height and the found value is then compared to percentiles relative to other children of the same age and sex. For example, if a child aged anywhere from 2-19 is “more than 85% and less than 95%” they are considered overweight. (Center for Disease Control and Prevention, 2009). This tool is not a method used to diagnosis childhood obesity but it 's a valuable way to measure the prevalence of obesity worldwide.

The key words used for this search were children, primary care, BMI screening, and obesity interventions. These key words were selected based on their relevance to the research question. BMI, or body mass index, is a tool that assists providers in identifying overweight and obese children (Kwapiszewski & Wallace, 2011). BMI for children and teens is computed by calculating their weight in kilograms divided by their square height in meters, taking their age and sex into consideration (CDC, 2015). A BMI at or above the 85th percentile is considered overweight and a BMI greater than or equal to the 95th percentile is considered obese (CDC, 2015). According to the World Health Organization (WHO, 2017), a healthy lifestyle is defined by a nutritious diet, participation in moderate to vigorous physical activity, and the maintenance of a normal body weight with a BMI between

The Walt Disney production “Wall-E” is a portrayed image of what our world could soon become. If you aren’t familiar with what the film is about, it is about obese humans relying on technology to do everything and anything for them. They weren’t concerned with their health at all, ordering jumbo soda and super-sized meals of fast food, for every meal. As Wall-E broads the ship and knocks some humans out of their delusional life style, they begin to realize something is seriously wrong with their health. Maybe it was because they couldn’t walk or maybe it was the realization that they couldn’t do anything for themselves. To make sure this doesn’t happen to the people of our world today, there is

In adults the body mass index or BMI is used to calculate a person’s body fat by using the weight and height of the adult. In children, the BMI method is also used to find out a child’s body fat and to determine if a child is obese. But since a child’s body fat can change as they age there are other things that are took into account when determining if a child is obese. When a doctor is looks at a child’s BMI he also must take into account the gender of the child because girls and boys body fat differs. Also the doctor must look at the age of the child because they amount of body fat a child has changes as they grow. Therefore, a doctor with take the BMI of child and compare it with other children their age and gender based on a national standard scale. When a child is in the ninety-fifth percentile or above on the BMI growth chart for their gender and age then a doctor will diagnose the child as obese (Bernstein, 2014).

Eating unhealthy sustenances routinely like quick sustenances, prepared merchandise and candy machine snacks builds weight (Mayo establishment). Research shows that right around 33% of the U.S. kids between ages four and nineteen eat fast food consistently; bringing about a weight pick up of around six additional pounds every year, per kid (NACHRI). Fast food utilization has expanded fivefold among kids since 1970. As a result of the wealth and accessibility of unfortunate nourishments, kids are inclined to getting plainly overweight or obese when their dietary patterns are not adjusted with an adequate measure of physical movement technology, for example, PC’s, TV’s, and computer games can likewise add to youth obesity.

“Obesity rates are increased among USA children by more than 300%” (Vitale). It is an epidemic that is alarmingly growing in children and growing into adulthood (Vitale, 2010).). It is important to realize that children are “not fully responsible for their own health choices and rely on adults to protect and nurture them; therefore need an environment

Described as the epidemic of the twenty and twenty-one centuries, obesity has reach alarming levels in the United States in the last three decades. The Center for Disease Control (CDC) declared that the prevalence of obesity was 36.5% (crude estimate) among U.S. adults during 2011–2014 (Cynthia L. Ogden, Margaret D. Carroll, & Cheryl D. Fryar, 2015). Obesity results from a combination of causes and contributing factors, including individual factors such as behavior and genetics. Behaviors can include dietary patterns, physical activity, inactivity, medication use, and other exposures. Two of the most important factors in our society include the increase in the consumption of fast food, which contains high quantities of trans fatty acids (TFAs) and fructose, and a marked decrease in physical activity. Both of them combined have resulted in the development of the serious widespread across the country. Likewise, it is extremely important to point that “obesity is associated with poorer mental health outcomes, reduced quality of life, and the leading causes of death in the U.S. and worldwide, such as diabetes, heart disease, stroke, and some types of cancer” (Center for Disease Control and Prevention, 2016). Which guides us to the necessity of expanding our health initiatives in order to increase the education, prevention and better alternatives for future generations.

To me obesity is a major concern throughout America and has driven our country to become the second most obese country (behind Mexico) in the world. It really didn’t dawn onto me on how big our country is pertaining to obesity until I started my Agronomy class this semester. On the first day of class my teacher informed us on how Louisiana has been ranked the most obese state for the first time in eight years in our nation, and as he went on I started to ask myself, “How could this happen?” Of course I started to ponder about Louisiana’s seafood and other delicate cuisine that people can’t get enough of which might cause an over indulgence of eating but that couldn’t be enough to cause obesity in Louisiana or even the nation. Well my

The fast food industry promotes childhood obesity by manipulating the young mind, putting them at risk for health complications such as hypertension and diabetes. The super-sizing of America is been a frequently talked about subject lately. Especially since it is seem to have negative effects on the health of children and adults alike through massive consumption of fast food. Health providers and other authority figures are now concerned about children’s obesity rates shown during the past 3-4 decades. They have now drawn a close connection between fast food and obesity and identified a childhood obesity epidemic with increased negative health factors. According to the American journal of public health, 2005 September issue, fast food