Empowering Healthy Kids Blog

Be sure to read the comments at the end about the hypocrisy of it all

Type 2 diabetes is a function of a poor lifestyle health choice and unfortunately we are seeing the rise in the prevalence of type 2 diabetes in children. Now a new study shows that Adult Type 2 diabetes can be predicted in childhood:

Researchers at the Cincinnati Children’sHospital Medical Center found that parental history of diabetes, as well as the presence of metabolic syndrome in childhood were major predictors of type 2 diabetes in adulthood. The finding was particularly true for black American men and women, the researchers report.

People with metabolic syndrome have at least three of the following health issues: high blood pressure; high triglycerides; high body mass; high blood glucose; and low levels of “good” high density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol.

Council planners vs kid planners:

adventure playgrounds are places where children can create and modify their own environments, rather than relying on rigid equipment that only serves a limit set of programmed purposes: “In a sense, you and I have always played in ‘adventure playgrounds.’ We created a fort in the kitchen cabinets, jumped from couch to couch across oceans; we snuck out through a hole in the fence to a new world. We climbed trees and hid in bushes. We played in the mud and the rain. We chased each other, made secret worlds …”

Click here for pics.

I came across a couple of Yorkshire’s Post’s Letters to the Editor, questioning obesity “experts”and the role of government in providing solutions to community problems:

From: Richard Bedford, Ellis Court, Scalby Road, Scarborough.

I AM writing to say that I am fed up to the back teeth with reading dubious reports about obesity, particularly where children are concerned (Yorkshire Post, November 17).

I encounter many children in the course of my work and very few could be described as overweight. Indeed, I tend to see more who appear thin and under-nourished.

Instead of accepting at face value the “figures” put out by the Government, I would like to know precisely how their information was gathered, by whom it was collated and exactly how many children were involved.

The same applies to the “predictions” by “experts” regarding adult obesity. Names of “experts”, please, qualifications, salaries and details of whom these faceless ones are working for. Incidentally, as I understand it, maths is an exact science – you can’t have “about 1 in 5.” It either is 1 in 5 or it’s something else.

We seem to be sleepwalking into a control-freak led society, blithely absorbing the twaddle pushed at us by teams of manipulative number crunchers with hidden agendas. It should never be forgotten that we do not elect governments to regulate every aspect of our lives.

I believe that this problem facing us has arisen because so many people perceive that our present party political governmental system is now outdated, inadequate and pointless. The obsession with surveys, percentages and predictions therefore has a deeply sinister side. Government is desperate to divert attention from all its many failings and control means survival.

We must know far more about the countless unelected “policy institutes” which seek to shape life in this country. Baroness Sayeeda Warsi enticed one representative out of the woodwork (Yorkshire Post, November 17), but this can only be the tip of the iceberg.

We all should continually question things far more deeply and demand proper answers.

Accept nothing less and, above all, remember the ultimate irony – they who occupy the seat of power, who were elected to serve their country, most emphatically have no intention of ever doing so.

Relying on experts and policy institutes can bring on a false sense that since “something” is done, then it is OK. My view is that it is up to us to empower kids to make positive decisions on their health. We should be working and supporting parents to create a healthy environment if they choose to do so. It is and always will be about choice. Children and parents will need to make the choice themselves. No amount of government regulation and rules will substitute for that.

Time is very precious these days and I appreciate you spending it on helping me on our product design. Thank you to those that helped.

Results just in:

A total of 312 primary schools across Victoria participated in last month’s Walktober Walk to School event which aimed to get ‘active transport’ - be it walking or cycling – on the daily agenda of families.

More than 56,000 Victorian children participated; that’s 18,000 more students than last year.

Twenty-nine primary schools reported that 100 per cent of students walked to school on the day, as compared with 15 schools in 2006.

Well done!

I came across Texas Legislation Senate Bill 530, which broadly aims to:

1) Set a minimum physical activity level of 30 minutes per week or 225 minutes over a 2 week period from kindergarten to grade 8.

2) Measure the physical fitness of students in grade 3 through to grade 12, focussing on:

(A) aerobic capacity;
(B) body composition; and
(C) muscular strength, endurance, and flexibility.

Parents may also request for their child’s physcial assessment.

3) Results wil be analysed by the Texas Education Agency to compute correlations between:

(A)  student academic achievement levels;
(B)  student attendance levels;
(C)  student obesity;
(D)  student disciplinary problems; and
(E)  school meal programs.

This legislation looks like a step towards making physical fitness as important as academic achievement.

More good work from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation with their Active Living Research initiative. In particular, their latest research on designing active living environments for children. Here is a summary of their conclusions (emphasis added):

• Obesity rates have increased dramatically among children of all ages in the United States, and physical inactivity contributes to the epidemic. Today, two thirds of adolescents do not meet the Surgeon General’s recommendation of 60 minutes of physical activity daily.
• Children and teens living in low-income communities and African-American, Latino, Native American, Asian and Pacific Islander children have a low percentage of physically active youth and are especially vulnerable to obesity.
• There is strong evidence linking access to facilities like parks, playgrounds and recreation programs with increased physical activity and reduced risk for obesity among kids. Studies also show that low-income and minority communities offer significantly fewer opportunities for residents to be active than do higher income communities.
• Young people living in neighborhoods that provide sidewalks, safe streets and destinations within walking distance from home are more physically active than those living in low-walkable suburbs.
• Safe Routes to School (SRTS) projects improve facilities like sidewalks and crosswalks, slow traffic and encourage policies that make it safer and easier for children to walk and bike to school. There is initial evidence that SRTS programs result in more students walking and biking to and from school.
• Schools can offer many opportunities for children to be physically active, including effective PE programs, updated playgrounds, well-maintained equipment and supervised activity breaks throughout the school day.
• Research-based PE programs have been shown to improve students’ physical fitness levels, yet many studies reveal a significant lack of PE programming in U.S. schools, especially among high school students and students living in low-income communities.
• Parental concern over traffic safety and neighborhood crime is a significant barrier to physical activity among children, especially in low-income communities.
• There is evidence linking excessive TV viewing to increased risk for obesity among children, and minority children are especially vulnerable. School-based interventions that promote physical activity and encourage students and parents to limit TV time show promise for reducing the risk of childhood obesity.

Following the news of a childhood obesity programme in India, Dr Wee Eng Hoe, a faculty member at Universiti Teknologi MARA, in Malaysia is looking at the differences between the way the US and Malaysia teach Physical Education (PE):

“There’s a very big difference between supervised recreation and an educational programme designed to make young people physically fit,”

“When taught by trained teachers using proper facilities, PE classes give young people the skills they’ll need to engage in a lifelong programme of fitness.

“In the light of the increase in childhood obesity in developed countries throughout the world, establishing quality physical fitness programmes in public schools has taken on international implications,” he added.

Childhood obesity is on the rise in Malaysia too. In an article entitled Childhood Globesity, the International Food Information Council reports that nearly 17% of Malaysian boys and 8% of Malaysian girls are obese.

These numbers parallel the disturbing rise of obesity in the United States, where the Centre for Disease Control reports that 25% of America’s youth are at risk of becoming obese, a rate that’s doubled in the last 10 years.

“The United States and Malaysia have different approaches to education,” said Dr Wee. “Malaysia adopts a more teacher-centred approach while American teachers and students both play active roles in the construction of knowledge.”

An interesting approach by HEAL (Healthy Eating, Active Living), a new community program based in Nashua:

The 5-2-1-0 program, implemented in the schools this year, teaches children to eat five vegetables and fruits a day, to limit screen time in front of a TV or computer to two hours or less, to participate in one hour of moderate to vigorous exercise and to drink no soda or sugar-sweetened sports and fruit drinks.

UPDATE: Some 5-2-1-0 resources here (under “Office Tools”)