Prevent Disease.com - Kids Risk Heart Disease As Teenagers If Obesity Epidemic is Not Addressed



		Kids Risk Heart Disease As Teenagers If Obesity Epidemic is Not Addressed Today's children face a future of heart disease, potentially as early as the end of their teen years, if parents and policy-makers don't urgently address the exploding problem of childhood obesity, a U.S. obesity expert warned. Dr. David Katz told delegates to the Canadian Cardiovascular Congress the research advances of the past couple of decades, which have improved the prognosis for people living with heart disease, are in danger of being lost. The threat is obesity and the fact that it triggers Type 2 diabetes. Both are risk factors for cardiovascular disease. "Children growing up in the U.S. and soon Canada are the first cohort in modern memory looking at a shorter life expectancy than their parents because of epidemic obesity and diabetes," said Katz, director of medical studies in public health at Yale University's school of medicine. He likened modern humans to polar bears in the desert, incapable of adapting to the environment they find themselves in. The human body was built for a time when food was scarce and securing enough to survive required extensive physical activity. In the past century - and most particularly the past couple of decades - humans have been virtually drowning in calories while living an increasingly sedentary lifestyle. Tempting high-fat food is at every turn, Katz said, noting the agricultural system in the United States produces the equivalent of 3,800 calories a day for every adult and child in that country - after exports. "Our ancestors did not have will power that we lack. They lacked the leaf blowers that we have," said Katz, who was delivering the Heart and Stroke Foundation lecture to the opening session of the congress. He insisted experts know how people should eat, dismissing fad diets that outlaw carbohydrates, for instance. The challenge, Katz said, is figuring out how to persuade people to eat a healthy, balanced diet in moderation and to get adequate amounts of exercise. Solutions have to involve the whole family, he said, suggesting children should be taught more about healthy versus unhealthy foods. And parents have to lead by example, forgoing the search for a quick fix to their own weight problems in order to teach their children how to eat right. Lines like: "Finish your food. There are starving children in China," have to be banished from modern households, he said. "It is time to put less food on the plates of our children, and if they have the good sense to stop eating when full, pat them on the back and say 'Well done' rather than worrying about how making our kids fat could possibly help starving kids someplace else in the world. And by the way, those kids are getting fat, too." He suggested parents make a conscientious effort to ensure their homes are safe food zones, so that kids can learn how to eat appropriately. "If we get people to understand how critically important it is to have a safe nutritional environment at home, to safeguard the welfare of their children so that their children are not sitting ducks, then they'll buy healthier products," said Katz, who said that kind of shift would prompt the food industry to start producing more healthful products. Parents should band together and demand that schools play a part, outlawing the sale of junk foods. "In a society where we have epidemic obesity and diabetes in children, I see a vending machine filled with junk food in a school every bit as unacceptable as a vending machine filled with packets of cigarettes," he said flatly. "If we can get all parents to see it that way, you know what? We'll put a stop to it." He suggested governments devise a simpler system of food labelling to make it easier for adults and children to find the foods they should be eating - and the ones they should avoid. A simple system of colour-coded stickers - green, yellow and red - could be used on all packaged foods, Katz said. Read a PDF report on Child Obesity "Public Health Crisis, Prevention as a Cure" Related articles on Child Obesity or Childhood Obesity Related articles on Overweight Children Reference Source 114 For more information on how to prevent other diseases, use PreventDisease.com's "Quick Prevention Resources".