"We've seen it sneaking up on us, we've known it's a problem, and
now it's reaching epidemic proportions," Anne Loudenslager told
CNN. She heads the Tioga County Partnership for Community Health.
"We are using a good portion of our limited resources to stop
this."
Dr. Ellsworth,
a director of research on the problem, said he hopes to have several
hundred children in a new health program this year. He calls himself
an optimist. One has to wonder why. Everything in the CNN health
report proves that things are going from bad to worse.
In northeast
Pennsylvania,
one in 10 kindergartners were found to be obese in 2001-2002. That
number doubled for eighth-graders.
These high
numbers of obesity are predictors of future health problems. During
a recent health fair, Ellsworth found that 60 percent of adults
tested had metabolic syndrome, a collection of unhealthy conditions
that raise the risk for diabetes and heart disease.
Nevertheless,
Ms. Loudenslager and Dr. Ellsworth talk tough. The community is
galvanized to solve this health crisis. At the largest high school
in the county, they plan to alter physical education next year.
Students will have more choices: sports teams, wellness classes,
and traditional gym classes. The goal is to get kids involved, get
them moving, and get them healthy.
Maybe they
want to help the kids, but shouldn’t we be asking a few questions
about their plan first? After all, the community resources are
limited. And here they are devoting a good portion of those
resources to unproven programs with no statistical evidence that new
gym classes will make kids loose weight.
If this were a
story on the epidemic of sexually transmitted diseases, reporters
would be all over the health officials demanding proof positive that
taxpayer money was not going to be wasted on failed programs.
If this were a
story on teen sex, reporters would not give the good Dr. Ellsworth a
pass at being an optimist. They would feed him the statistics to
prove how hopeless the future is for fat teens.
After all, Dr.
Ellsworth said it himself. "The numbers for obesity in children
were nowhere near what they are today and you can just imagine what
we're going to be looking at 10 to 20 years from now if nothing is
done," he told reporters. "That 60 percent ... that's going to seem
like a pretty low figure."
If this were a
story on abstinence, reporters would help him prove the hopelessness
of the future. They would pick a teen and show how impossible Dr.
Ellsworth’s job will be.
"I've started
trying to take it easy on the junk food," sophomore Ray Crawford
says. At 240 pounds and 5 ft. 9 inches tall, he is already a
promising lineman for the school’s football team. And if he’s
overweight, he’s not alone. So are many of his classmates.
Sure Ray hopes
to change his eating habits and exercise. But a good reporter would
go after such baseless optimism. After all, Ray’s father died of
heart disease at 45. And, according to Dr. Jeff Holm of North
Dakota,
"...Habits are passed vertically from Grandma on down.”
If this were a
story on abstinence, the reporter would search high and low for
experts to quote on the inevitability of fat habits. After all,
eating is natural. All kids are going to eat. Do we want kids to
feel bad about themselves, hurting their self-esteem by telling them
they are fat?
If this were a
story on abstinence, the reporter would serve up a research study to
prove that nobody can really lose weight and keep it off. We would
read about yo-yo diets where kids lose weight one week, and put it
back on the next.
If this were a
story on abstinence, the reporter would find a student who had
failed. We would hear all about how temptation was just too hard to
pass up. Photos would trace the weight gain of the student from
kindergarten to high school, and quotes would be plied from the
student: “I’ve tried, but I just can’t seem to control myself.”
And armed with
data, quotes, and examples, the reporter would stick it to the good
doctor. “Aren’t you just wasting your time? Wouldn’t taxpayer
money be better spent on finding ways to make Styrofoam into tasty
and nutritious food substitutes?”
Where are the
tough journalists when you need them? Where is the skepticism, the
doubt, the challenge and resistance?
You can talk
about exercise all day long. You can have your fancy schmancy gyms,
and you can serve vegetables in the school cafeteria. But before we
give you one thin dime of our precious limited resources, tell us
what we want to know.
Do exercise
and good eating habits work?
