Child Obesity

For the most part as mankind has progressed the average life expectancy has gone up with each generation. That trend, however, is now in check do to the increasing prevalence of child obesity. Some authorities are now saying it is likely that todays generation of children may live as much as five years less than their parents. Deseases related to obesity like type 2 diabetes, heart disease, kidney failure, and cancer are all factors in this projection. One doctor stated in this article that we are in the quiet before the storm. Basically he is saying that because of the growing amount of obese children in this country we are soon to be faced with an epidemic of health care problems resulting from a mass number of the population suffering from the effects of a life time of being extremely over weight. The problem is so real and so bad that some people are worried a huge increases in government health care expenses while others are saying it is so bad that the government will save a ton in social security payouts because people are going to die so quickly. To me this just means that we as health educators need to get serious when it comes to our physical fitness units and treat it as important as other classroom health topics like mental health.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/17/health/17obese.html