Only Parents Can Keep Children Off Path To Obesity, Ill Health

Only Parents Can Keep Children Off Path To Obesity, Ill Health

When parents dream of a future for their children, it doesn't include diabetes, strokes, heart disease, osteoarthritis or several types of cancers. Those are a few of the severe ailments that the federal Centers for Disease Control attribute to adult obesity. We need to ensure that children will grow up to become healthy and fully functioning members of society by providing them with healthy meals and lifestyles right from birth.

A study by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services shows that, over the past 30 years, the percentage of overweight youth in our country has increased annually — tripling overall since the 1980s. We need to buck that trend by educating our children about the importance of health. All parents need to do their part to ensure that eating healthy and exercising are entrenched in children's minds.