Having access to clean drinkable water and healthy fresh foods is vital in ensuring children grow up to be a healthy weight. New funds from the state's congressional delegation recently announced that $2.1 million in funds will go to help position new AmeriCorps members into volunteer services for the state. One organization called the Washington County Youth Service Bureau Boys and Girls Club, will help to ensure children of veteran and military families grow up to be a healthy weight. They will receive $325,000 for 26 volunteers, that will help to implement initiatives to help prevent childhood obesity in the state. More funds will also be used to help position AmeriCorps members in addressing problems in affordable housing, water quality, and veteran affairs. To ...
Most Americans are still not aware of the many serious health consequences associated with being obese. Additionally, misconceptions about what healthy weight and obesity look like further complicates adults' and parents' ability to correctly identify weight status, thus they are unable to correctly identify their and their children's risk for life-long health complications. According to the Nutrition and Physical Activity Initiative at the Bipartisan Policy Center (BPC) 2012 report, "obese people are far more likely to develop chronic diseases like diabetes, hypertension, asthma, heart disease and cancer. Obese children are more likely to have one or more risk factors for cardiovascular disease, to be prediabetic (i.e., at high risk for developing diabetes), and to suffer from bone ...
New research centers in Harvard and John Hopkins and USC will work to address research in hopes to improve health in communities overburdened by pollution and environmental factors. The Maternal and Developmental Risks from Environmental and Social Stressors Center (MADRES) will recruit and research 750 mother -infant pairs from low-income urban hospitals in the Los Angeles area over three years to determine how environmental factors impact child weight, and how psychological stress and behavior risk factors impact the mother's weight gain before and after pregnancy. Pollution was been shown to be a key factor in pregnant rats gaining weight within a recent study. Latino's are often faced with higher risks for obesity, explained Keck School of Medicine professor, Carrie Breton, ...
A recent news article announced that former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg will help provide financial support the nonprofit Philadelphians for a Fair Future. The Philadelphians for a Fair Future group is currently working on an ad campaign to support a 3 cents per ounce soda tax, which will raise support in the millions for universal pre-k and community schools for parks and library improvements. Other news articles even show a study from Harvard that reports that Philadelphia could save over $190 million in health-care costs if the proposal is passed. The American Beverage Association has spent millions in ads towards Latino kids and has spent millions in working against similar soda tax and labeling proposals across the nation, Research shows that Latino kids are ...
How can one family have an impact on reducing obesity in their school and beyond? Just look at the Surani teen sisters of Corpus Christi, Texas. After learning that their city had been named the fattest in the nation and how obesity is a huge health threat among children, the three girls wanted to take action They, with the help of their parents and others, created several programs to improve children’s health, including the iConquer program to help kids beat obesity by achieving healthy lifestyles starting from the early ages of 3 to 6 years old.
Teen Sisters Aim for Better Health
Fifteen-year-old Zoya Surani, along with sisters Sara (19) and Saherish (16), grew up in a household where healthy choices were commonplace. Their father, a pulmonologist, and mother, a respiratory ...
The Endocrine Society recently published research that reveals exposure to endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs) is associated with increased risk of developing diabetes and obesity. These common chemicals are found in everyday items like food can linings, cash register receipts, plastics, cosmetics, flame retardants and pesticides. “The evidence is more definitive than ever before – EDCs disrupt hormones in a manner that harms human health,” said Andrea C. Gore, Professor and Vacek Chair of Pharmacology at the University of Texas at Austin, in a recent Newswise article. Gore went on to state that, “Hundreds of studies are pointing to the same conclusion, whether they are long-term epidemiological studies in human, basic research in animals and cells, or research into ...
More education and counseling is needed to teach overweight women in the U.S. with hopes to become pregnant about the dangers of being overweight during pregnancy, Reuters reports. A new study published in the Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics revealed that 31 percent of overweight women hoping to get pregnant “mistakenly thought their weight was 'about right' and 47 percent thought their diet was healthy and saw no reason to adjust what they were eating.” “Overweight women trying to conceive largely misperceive their weight, which is concerning because they may not try to adopt healthier behaviors,” study author Mahbubur Rahman of the University of Texas Medical Branch (UTMB) in Galveston told Reuters. The study administered questionnaires to 1,726 women ...
In the Fairfax County Public School District in Fairfax, Va., a parent group called Real Food for Kids had rid school cafeterias of highly processed junk foods and improved the nutrition of school snacks and menus. But the change was not very visible to students. So the group, led by parent JoAnne Hammermaster, helped bring a fresh food stations showcase the healthier selections—and add new ones—for students at district schools.
The Need for Healthy School Food
Awareness: Childhood obesity is a priority for the parent group Real Food for Kids (RFFK), which pushes for healthy changes in the Fairfax County Public School District (FCPSD), a 22% Latino district in Fairfax, Va. In 2012, for example, RFFK drove FCPSD leaders to remove foods with artificial dyes, additives, and ...
Jeff Anderson, a parent at Wolftrap Elementary School in Fairfax, Va., wanted his daughter to bike to school. Unfortunately, the school had no bike racks. He went to the principal and the school installed bike racks. But he did more than ask for bike racks. Anderson joined other parents, school officials, and community partners to improve one of the school district’s transportation policies. Now parents from all over the community have created safe routes for kids to walk and bike to district schools.
The Issue of a Lack of Safe Places to Play
Awareness: In Spring 2008, Jeff Anderson noticed that there were no bike racks at Wolftrap Elementary School in Vienna, Va., a city with a 12% Latino population. An avid bicyclist, Anderson wanted his then-first-grade daughter to learn ...
