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Youth
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, obesity and overweight among children and teens has drastically increased over the past three decades, almost tripling since 1980. The Coalition for Healthy Children cites that one third of children and teenagers do not engage in regular physical activity. This lack of activity and increase in overweight has many consequences: among overweight 5 to 10-year-olds, 61% have one risk factor for heart disease, and 26% have two or more risk factors. In addition, hospital costs related to treating overweight and obese children and adolescents more than tripled from $35 million during 1979-1981 to $127 million during 1997-1999.
The Importance of Exercise
It is more important than ever to promote physical activity and healthy lifestyles to children and teenagers in order to reverse current trends. According to a study done by the National Association of Sports and Physical Education, infants and pre-schoolers should engage in at least 60 minutes of physical activity daily and should not be sedentary for more than 60 minutes at a time except when sleeping. More and more research points to the fact that habits established in youth are often kept for life. According to the United States Department of Health and Human Services, overweight adolescents have a 70 percent chance of becoming overweight or obese adults; this increases to 80 percent if the child has an overweight or obese parent.
Research Studies
Want kids to be more active? Give them a ball and a jump rope!
Rather than playing outside or participating in sports, some kids are opting to play video games, chat on the internet and watch television. Researchers assessed the physical and social environments of participating child care centers across North Carolina and found that stationary equipment such as swings, slides, and climbing structures were associated with lower levels of physical activity. However, portable play equipment such as jump ropes, hula hoops, and balls were associated with significantly higher levels of moderate to vigorous physical activity.1
Regular exercise can help prevent hay fever in kids
Anyone who suffers from seasonal allergies knows that the sniffling, sneezing and itchy eyes associated with hay fever can be miserable. But promising research out of Germany indicates that kids who exercise regularly while they are young are less likely to develop hay fever and allergies.2
Exercise reduces the risk of hypertension later in life
New research published in the American Journal of Public Health provides further evidence that regular exercise during adolescence and early adulthood can help individuals lower their blood pressure. Researchers followed a group of 4,000 individuals ages 18 to 30 for over 15 years and found that participants who exercised five days a week and burned at least 300 calories during each exercise session were 17 percent less likely to develop hypertension later in life.3
Exercise in teenage years may prevent breast cancer later in life
While breast cancer commonly affects women over the age of forty-five, a quarter of all breast cancer cases are diagnosed in younger women, and these cancers tend to be more aggressive. A new study published in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute has found that teenage girls who exercise regularly can reduce their risk of breast cancer in their early years of adulthood. Nearly 65,000 nurses answered questionnaires about their physical activity dating back to age 12. Women who were physically active in their teenage years were 23 percent less likely to develop breast cancer later in life. Women with the lowest incidence of breast cancer exercised vigorously for a minimum of 3 ¼ a week as teenagers.4
Inactive kids are six times more likely to have heart disease in their teen years
It is a well-known fact that heart disease is the number one killer of both men and women in the U.S. However with childhood obesity and inactivity on the rise, teens are now at risk for this deadly disease as well. In recent years metabolic syndrome, a combination of diseases that increase the risk of diabetes and heart disease and is commonly found in overweight adults, has begun to effect people in their teen years.
In order to uncover more about the early onset of metabolic syndrome, researchers followed a group of 400 children between the ages of 7 and 10 for 7 years. The study found that participants with three or more indicators of metabolic syndrome were six times more likely to have low cardiovascular fitness levels and five times more likely to have low levels of physical activity.5
References:
1Bower JK, et al. (2007). The childcare environment and children's physical activity. American Journal of Preventative Medicine, 34, 23-9.
2Kohlhammer Y, Zutavern A, Rzehak P, Woelke G and Heinrich J. (2006). Influence of physical inactivity on the prevalence of hay fever. Allergy, 61, 1310-15.
3Parker ED, Schmitz KH, Jacobs DR, Dengel DR and Schreiner PJ. (2007). Physical activity in young adults and incident hypertension over 15 years of follow-up: The CARDIA study. American Journal of Public Health, 4, 703-9.
4Maruti SS, et al. (2008). A prospective study of age-specific physical activity and premenopausal breast cancer. Journal of the National Cancer Institute, 100 (10), 728-737.
5McMurray RG, et al. (2008). Adolescents with metabolic syndrome have a history of low fitness and physical activity levels. Dynamic Medicine, 7, 5.
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