Unhealthy choices: young and unfit

Children in previous decades spent their free time riding bikes and kicking a ball up and down neighborhood streets, but recent studies show that many, if not most, kids today are watching television and playing with computers.

Playtime no longer means physical activity, increasing the number of children with obesity and other health problems.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report that nationally more than 15 percent of children are overweight, up significantly from just a decade ago. For African-American and Hispanic children, the number is one in four. The number of overweight adults is even higher.

The Utah Health Department this year studied students to see what's going on here, because most of the numbers available are either national or from other areas.

Joan Ware, director of cardiovascular health for the department, told the Deseret News that one-fourth of all Utah children, K-8, are at an unhealthy weight and one in eight is obese. They weighed and measured more than 10,000 little Utahns to reach that conclusion.

To make matters worse, said a group of educators who gathered recently at Alta Lodge to discuss the problem, the national "No Child Left Behind" initiative left physical education behind. The results could be disastrous for an entire generation.

"It left P.E. out all together," said Julie Christofferson, who oversees the physical education curriculum in the Jordan District. "It blows my mind. How can you learn math and science if you don't feel good?"

Children's health

With excess weight comes Type 2 diabetes and heart disease, two life-limiting and potentially deadly conditions that were virtually nonexistent in children and young adults in the past. A recent study indicates that a child born in 2000 has a 33 percent chance of developing Type 2 or insulin-resistant diabetes.

It used to be called adult-onset diabetes and seldom appeared before about age 50. Now insulin resistance in girls may upset hormonal balance and result in facial hair, acne and ovarian cysts. For both sexes, long-term complications include heart attacks, strokes, amputations, blindness, kidney failure.

"It's one of our main concerns," said Karmeen Kulkerni, coordinator of the Diabetes Center at St. Mark's Hospital, who was recently elected vice president of health care and education for the American Diabetes Association. "We're seeing Type 2 diabetes increase among young children, adolescents, youths, young adults. It's something we haven't seen until 10 years ago. "