When it comes to the expanding waistlines of youth in the United States, here are the facts as reported in the January Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine:
“Sixteen percent of US adolescents are currently overweight or obese, and 85 percent of obese adolescents become obese adults. The prevalence of overweight in adolescents has more than tripled since 1980.”
A solution to this problem, researchers at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health found, was exercise, specifically extracurricular physical activites like rollerblading, skateboarding, bicycling, jogging, walking, karate, jumping rope, gymnastics, dancing, and sports like baseball, softball, basketball, soccer, swimming, and football.
Participating in these kinds of activities five days a week decreased the odds of being an overweight adult by 28 percent. The likelihood of adult obesity was most reduced by participating in wheeled activities like rollerblading, skateboarding and bicycling more than four times a week.
Unfortunately, most teens don’t get enough exercise and even those who are active don’t continue that healthy habit into adulthood. A study of 13,030 teens by researchers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 2004 found that only only 36 percent of teens get five or more bouts of moderate to vigorous activity a week and of those only 4.4 percent maintined that level of activity into adulthood.
Are there any parents of teens out there who have found a way to pry their kids from the computer and couch and get them moving? What works? What doesn’t work?
This issue of physical activity isn’t just about weight, it’s about a lifestyle which has benefits that can’t be measured on a scale. Like a long, healthy life, for one.