Childhood obesity ‘alarming’ in Whitfield-Murray

Editor’s note: This is the first in a two-part series. The second part, on what local health officials plan to do to combat childhood obesity, will appear in Wednesday’s Daily Citizen.

Doctors and other health care professionals have been sounding the warning for years about sedentary kids in front of TV sets, video games and computers — and the high cost society will have to pay for health problems related to childhood obesity.

The problem in Whitfield and Murray is even worse, according to statistics gathered by local health officials.

“It’s very disturbing, and very alarming,” said Ali Donahue, marketing coordinator for the Northwest Georgia Healthcare Partnership. “Kids are going to the doctor way too much, even for things people in their 60s and 70s usually go for.”

Carmel Cowart is the school wellness coordinator for the partnership. She has tracked students beginning in the second grade in 2006 to the fourth grade in 2008 in the three local school systems: Whitfield and Murray counties and Dalton city. She has been looking for trends in regard to overweight children and those at risk of becoming overweight.

“It hasn’t been a scientific or even controlled study,” Cowart pointed out, “but more of a screening. An expert statistician from Shaw Industries has analyzed the data and given us the changes and trends.”

The study reveals:

• In 2006, 27.4 percent of the children were considered overweight, with 19.9 percent considered at risk of becoming overweight.

• In 2007, the overweight group rose to 29.3 percent and the at-risk kids climbed to 22 percent.

• In 2008, the overweight children stayed at 29.3 percent and the at-risk group dropped to 19.5 percent.

Being overweight as defined by the federal Centers for Disease Control means that a child has a body mass index (BMI) that is above the 95th percentile for his or her age. A BMI above the 85th percentile for his or her age puts a child at risk of becoming overweight, according to the CDC.

In 2006, 1,899 children were in the study, in 2007 the number was 1,321, and in 2008, 1,974 kids were involved. The numbers were not constant due to children moving in and out of the system and other variables.

Lest a cheer go up that maintenance or positive gains were seen in the last year of the study, it should be noted that the national average for children who are overweight in 2008 is 16 percent, and the national average for kids at risk of becoming overweight is also 16 percent, according to an article in The New York Times on May 28 of this year.

“Although the 2 percent positive change (in at-risk kids in 2008) is not statistically significant,” noted Cowart, “we can still look at it as a success. The CDC numbers are leveling off nationally, but it’s still a problem. If you add the percentage of overweight kids in 2008 with the at-risk of overweight, that’s 48.8 percent, or almost half of our kids in the community are at risk of developing health problems related to excess weight.”

The use of words such as “obese” and “overweight” have changed recently in regard to children. For example, a 2005 Georgia Department of Human Resources release on overweight third-graders found 24 percent were “obese” and 19 percent were “overweight.” Added together, 43 percent of the state’s third-graders were saddled with weight problems, regardless of how one terms the problem.

“Childhood obesity is a severe health problem in Georgia,” the DHR report concluded.

The litany of health problems that are predicted, and that in fact doctors are already seeing in children decades too soon, are frightening. According to Cowart and other health professionals, overweight children are at risk of:

• Development of Type II diabetes

• Cardiovascular complications like high blood pressure, and atherosclerosis, or hardening of the arteries

• Orthopedic problems such as knee and other joint pain

• Elevated cholesterol levels

• Increase in acid reflux

• Asthma complications

• Shortness of breath due to being severely overweight

“It’s an accumulating process,” Cowart explained. “If kids start out younger with these symptoms, by (age) 35 they will have significant health issues. These complications will cause a burden on their lives and decrease their value of life, not only physically but also economically. They will not be as productive.”

Donahue pointed to the link between activity and academics.

“It’s been proven that if kids are involved in sports and physical activity they will do better in school,” she said. “Conversely, if kids are sedentary they will not do better. They lose more school days (to absence) when they are sedentary and obese, and they won’t feel like doing physical activity.”

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Obesity in Georgia’s kids (Source: Georgia Department of Human Resources, 2005)

• Approximately 1 in 4 (24 percent) of third-grade children in Georgia were obese.

• Girls were more likely to be obese (25 percent) than boys (22 percent).

• Black children were more likely to be obese (27 percent) than white children (21 percent).

• Children from low socioeconomic households were more likely to be obese (26 percent) than those from high socioeconomic households (21 percent).

• Children from rural areas were more likely to be obese (26 percent) than children from metropolitan Atlanta (21 percent).

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