NORTH END — Obesity is a national epidemic.
More alarming than the 62 percent of adults nationwide who are obese, according to statehealthfacts.org., is the growing prevalence of childhood obesity.
Although many recent articles report levels of youth obesity have tapered off, it’s still a significant concern, as National Public Radio reported on May 28, “a third of U.S. kids remain either overweight, obese or morbidly obese.”
Those rates are reflected throughout the county and in the North Kitsap School District.
“The rates of obesity in our county have at least doubled since the 1970s,” said Beth Lipton, an epidemiologist for the Kitsap County Health District. “Obesity is an epidemic among students. We’re looking at about 26 percent of our kids are overweight or at risk. One in four kids is a lot.”
Every two years school district students across Washington take the Healthy Youth Survey, which is an exhaustive survey of more than 260 health related questions. Twenty of those questions apply to diet and nutrition choices, exercise habits and time spent in front of a screen — either television or computer.
The county doesn’t have a system in place to collect Body Mass Index data — a number calculated from an individual’s height and weight — therefore the best indicator of student obesity rates is the survey, Lipton said.
She added the survey is self-reported data and therefore an underestimate. Based upon the survey’s most recent numbers from 2006, an underreport “definitely speaks to a concerning issue,” Lipton said.
According to the survey, 24.7 percent of NKSD eighth-graders and 22.5 percent of 10th-graders were either at risk of overweight or overweight, and 38.2 percent of eighth-graders, 44.4 percent of 10th-graders and 33.3 percent of 12th-graders would like to lose weight.
While the numbers speak for themselves, several throughout the district visually observe the students’ changing weight patterns.
Seabeck native Lisa Ballou, a board member of the Kitsap County Medical Society Foundation and local health advocate who spent the past year visiting elementary schools throughout the county, observed the entire schools’ populations and said at least one quarter of the students are overweight.
At NKSD Vonnie Saucerman, nurse and supervisor of Health Services, has noted a similar trend.
“I know when I was in school there would be one obese kid in the classroom and now I look around and there will be half a dozen,” Saucerman said. “If this trend continues this is going to be the first generation of children that won’t outlive their parents.”
Saucerman’s youth life expectancy concerns are valid, as the onset of obesity at a young age can cause damaging health affects.
Among the health risks: hypertension, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, stroke, gallbladder disease, hip and joint problems and cancer.
“Those are the chief morbidities associated with chronic obesity,” Saucerman said.
Some of those health concerns, which are usually reserved for adults to worry about, are now showing up in youth.
“We’re seeing a lot more diabetes in kids and other problems like high cholesterol that weren’t previously diagnosed,” Lipton said.
Awareness of the problem is only one slice of the obesity pie. Causes and remedies are essential pieces, and county health experts and NKSD have joined the student nutrition and physical activity awareness campaign.
Unfortunately, decreasing the rates of student obesity won’t happen overnight, but requires implementing lifestyle changes, which can take years.
CAUSES
The predominant factors in student obesity are two-fold — kids are less active and have more access to unhealthy and less nutritious foods.
Cut and dry, however, it’s a lot more complicated.
Society now operates at a pace faster than light, which means there’s far less time for physical activity, time spent sitting at the table eating dinner or even time to prepare healthy, homecooked meals.
Only 35.9 percent of eighth-graders, 15.7 percent of 10th-graders and 12.5 percent of the district’s 12th-graders reported “always” eating dinner with their family, while 10.3 percent of eighth-graders, 17.3 percent of 10th-graders and 25 percent of 12th-graders said they spent no time exercising for at least 20 minutes during the week.
These changes are also taking place at the state level.
“The bad news is the amount of screen time increased and the number of meals eaten with family decreased,” Ruth Abad, Washington Department of Health Healthy Community specialists wrote in an e-mail. “There’s two barriers, so much time is spent on testing, which takes time away from P.E. and funding for healthier foods and P.E. specialists cost districts money and they have to make cuts.”
Compounding the list of problems is portion size and advertising, Saucerman said.
“TV markets to kids for lots of non-nutritious things,” she said. “Things are packaged to make people assume they can eat the whole package because it’s just a portion, but actually it’s not.”
Saucerman has been in the classroom talking to students about portions, and they don’t get it.
She had students read the labels for a bottled drink and a bag of chips. Most said it was one serving size, actually it’s 2.5 servings. She repeated the same exercise with the contents of the students’ sack lunches.
“It was blowing their minds,” Saucerman said. “They were looking at things they were going to eat for lunch and realized it was almost two lunches because of the serving sizes.”
She said they’re looking into a “Portion Distribution” curriculum, which will help kids determine accurate serving sizes.
REMEDIES
While the lists of student obesity health concerns and causes is long and daunting, there are a multitude of belt tightening and scale relieving solutions. Many of which are already in place at the district level.
The school board has adopted a nutrition and physical activity policy and procedure aimed at providing students access to nutritional food and physical fitness outlets. The complete policy can be read online at www.healthyschoolswa.org by clicking on the “School Wellness Policies” tab. NKSD’s food service and health programs are also pulling their weight in efforts to decrease student obesity.
The district’s food service program offers healthy choices and in no way puts students at a risk of weight gain, said Dan Blazer, NKSD Food and Nutrition Services director. He said the district follows nutrition value and meal components set by the United Sates Department of Agriculture (USDA).
“I do not believe that foods offered, as long as we’re following USDA values, lead to childhood obesity,” he said. “We don’t serve enough of any one of those foods that cause students to be obese.”
In recent years the district has switched from white flours to using more wheat and whole grain products, and approximately 10 years ago self-serve fresh fruit and vegetable bars were implemented in the lunch rooms. Each week the students may select from several varieties of fruits and vegetables — broccoli, cauliflower, carrots, cucumbers, grapes, apples, strawberries, bananas, kiwis and oranges.
“If students are obese they’re eating other foods offered outside the food service program and they’re lacking exercise,” Blazer said.
The district’s health and physical education department has also upped the health awareness ante.
Steve Frease, North Kitsap High School PE department chair, said a Life Long Wellness class curriculum was implemented this year as a means to address obesity trends and get health information into the hands of students.
Students in the class do physical fitness three days a week and spend two days in the classroom talking about the five tiers of health: social, intellectual, mental, loss/grief and spiritual.
“We’re taking it beyond food groups and looking at energy intake and out put, weight loss and exercise programs,” Frease said. “The message is that they certainly have the power and control, and with the proper approach they can get back into their ideal body weight.”
He said most students are aware, and that they say the class is a good reminder of issues to come, it’s nice to have an opportunity to work out regularly and to identify community resources that can help.
While the district and county health experts are doing their part, education, awareness and involvement at the household level top the solution list. The best advice: avoid snacking on high fat and non-nutritious foods, turn the screen off and exercise regularly — even if that means going for a 20-minute walk — monitor portion sizes, eat in moderation and drink lots of water. One extra bit of advice for parents only: lead by example.
“Parents need to learn about healthy choices, how to be active as a family and limit time in front of a screen,” Lipton said. “It really depends on lifestyle and what the whole family is doing. It really will take a collaborative effort.”
