A person’s gender, height and weight determine his or her Body Mass Index, or BMI, which is then used to determine if that person is overweight. (For children and teens, age is also a factor in determining BMI.)
BMI of 85 – 95%: Overweight
BMI of 95% and above: Obese
Statistics on Overweight and ObesityApproximately 119 million Americans, or 64.5%, of adult Americans are either overweight or obese. 25% of American adults are obese.
Approximately ten million, or 31%, of American children ages 10 -17 are overweight or obese.
More than 16% of children ages 6 – 19 are obese, an increase of 50% since the 1990s.
Since 1970, the prevalence of obesity among adolescents ages 12 to 19 in the United States has more than doubled; it has almost tripled for children ages 6 to 11.
Nearly 90% of overweight or obese adolescents will become obese adults, according to a recent study.
Health Issues and Cost of ObesityChildren who are overweight are at heightened risk for poor health outcomes, including the following:
- High cholesterol and high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, and social and psychological problems such as stigmatization and poor self-esteem.
- Becoming overweight or obese adults, and therefore being at higher risk of developing heart disease, type 2 diabetes, stroke, and several types of cancer.
One study determined that only 36.7% of overweight children and teens ages 2-19 years had been told by a doctor or other health-care professional that they were overweight.
According to a new study from RTI and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, medical costs of obesity in the United States has an estimated annual cost of $147 billion.
Public health and demographic researchers are predicting that this generation may be the first in American history to have a shorter life expectancy than their parents.
Studies show unhealthy lifestyles can decrease expected life span by as much as 8 – 14 years.
Attempts to Stem the Tide on Weight IssuesBillions of dollars are already at work trying to combat this trend. These initiatives fall into one of two categories: (1) Initiatives to try to “turn back the clock” on our obesogenic environment – making school lunches healthier, getting sodas and junk food out of schools, making neighborhoods more walkable; and (2) Awareness and education campaigns for parents and kids to improve diet and/or increase activity.
Both types of initiatives are well-meaning, but neither has proven in any way effective at helping the millions already overweight adolescents return to a healthy weight. A 2007 report by the Associated Press showed that while the federal government spent $1 billion on education-based programs, only 3 programs had any impact on healthy eating habits, and none of the 57 programs had any impact on the body mass index (BMI) of children in the program.
Michelle Obama recently announced the "Let's Move" campaign, designed to solve the adolescent obesity epidemic within a generation. Wellspring is encouraged by additional attention to this important issue. Even if “Let’s Move” is the first highly successful prevention campaign, the need remains for leadership from scientific, behaviorally based programs like Wellspring.