What Is Causing the Peak in Childhood Obesity Rates?
The good news is that after years of explosive growth, levels of U.S. childhood obesity may be leveling off. The possible bad news is that the ongoing efforts by the nations nutrition and health specialists may have had little to do with it. The findings that obesity levels among teenagers have peaked is only preliminary, based on an initial study by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The CDC study, led by Cynthia Ogden of the National Center for Health Statistics, monitored more than 8,000 children Even so, experts such as Dr. Robert Keith, an Alabama Cooperative Extension System nutrition and health specialist and Auburn University professor of nutrition and food science, are heartened by the change. The positive thing is that all of the educational messages that we have been trying to drive home to parents and schoolchildren alike over the past 15 years are finally getting through and that at least some people are listening and following through with these changes.
