The Question of the Priority of the Well Being and Health of Children in Western Society - Essay Example

?To what extent is children's well-being a priority in modern western societies? Introduction Children’s well-being is one of the most fundamental determinants of the overall social well-being in a society. Of all the issues that constitute children’s wellbeing, a very important and major issue is childhood obesity. These days, many modern western societies are facing the challenge of overcoming childhood obesity. Childhood obesity is also a very important challenge in front of the government both in the US and the UK. This paper draws a comparison between the prevalence of and measures to prevent the childhood obesity between the US and the UK and tends to find out the extent to which, children’s well-being is a priority in the two countries. Threats to children’s well-being in the US Childhood obesity To date, many nutrition and behavior-based interventions have been made both within the home and the school but have achieved very little, if any, success in preventing the overweight or obesity in children. Presently, children in the US experience sobering rates of obesity. “In 2009–2010, 16.9% of U.S. children and adolescents were obese” (Ogden et al., 2012, p. 2). The obese children in the US face different kinds of health complications including heart disease in the very early years of their life. Causes of childhood obesity in the US The main factors linked with the increased risk of obesity in children particularly in the stage of infancy include but are not limited to excessive weight gain in women during pregnancy, smoking during pregnancy, lesser duration of breast-feeding, and lesser than required sleep of the children during infancy. These exposures are the major risk factors to children’s well-being in the US because they occur during the early stages of development of children and thus regulate the energy balance in them in the long run. These factors specifically influence the hypothalamic circuits’ development which regulates the weight, the endocrine pancreatic function, changes in the lean body mass’s proportion to the fat body mass, and also several other metabolic programming cycles. In light of the aforementioned factors of risk of increased tendency of the children to become overweight or obese, programs or campaigns meant to prevent obesity in the children should specifically influence the earliest stages of development of the children so that the children develop right habits right from the very start of their life and can easily sustain them during the subsequent stages of development. The vulnerability of the children in the US to obesity can be reduced by designing interventions that help reduce excessive gain of weight as well as smoking during the pregnancy in women, increase the breast-feeding’s duration for the children, and provide the children with more sleep in the stage of infancy. Programs to ensure children’s well-being in the US The Let’s Move Campaign In the US, children’s wellbeing as always been a priority, yet objective measures could not be taken since the efforts made have largely been experiments that have not yielded very fruitful results. However, the present government of the US has taken the issue of childhood wellbeing quite seriously and some very effective measures have been taken in this regard. For example, one of the campaigns for the prevention of childhood obesity have been started by the First Lady Michelle Obama on 9 February 2010 with the name “Let’s Move” (letsmove.gov, n.d.). The Let’s Move campaign proposes several practicable measures against the sedentary lifestyle of all communities in the US in general and the children and especially the infants in particular since a considerable population of children in the US become obese right from the first two years of their life and accordingly, all complexities and health risks of obesity in children ensue. The main antiobesity strategies of the Let’s Move campaign are directed at empowering the consumers of the food products as well as the parents. To achieve this, the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) has been assigned the responsibility to revamp the food products’ nutritional labeling. The Let’s Move campaign has been started with the intention to improve the National School Lunch Program’s nutritional standards, increase the opportunities as well as facilities of physical activities for the children, and improve the access of all communities in the US to the high-quality foods. “This innovative multifactorial approach has potential for altering the course of the childhood obesity crisis — changing our country's approach to eating, nutrition, and physical activity by simultaneously targeting individuals, neighborhoods, and larger communities” (Wojcicki and Heyman, 2010). The Let’s Move campaign is likely to be very effective in preventing obesity in children because it makes interventions in the early stage of development of children. Many studies have shown that the development of obesity in the children as well as several health complications that are associated with obesity can be prevented if the interventions are made in the early stage. For example, Wrotniak and colleagues conducted a research as a result of which they found that women that were overweight during pregnancy had 48 per cent higher risk of having an overweight child at the age of 7 years as compared to women whose weight fell within the range recommended by the Institute of Medicine (IOM) (Wrotniak et al., 2008). In addition to that, the World Health Organization (WHO) has stated that breast-feeding’s long-term benefits include but are not limited to reduced risk of obesity in children, reduced risk of the type 2 diabetes mellitus, and also reduced risk of low blood pressure in the children during their adulthood. Other campaigns of children well-being in the US Children’s well-being is the main focus of many on-going campaigns in the US that also include the programs meant to reduce the rate of smoking as well as to extend the period of breast-feeding in women since these measures are integrally linked with decrease in the children’s vulnerability to obesity in the later stages of development. One of such campaigns is the US Preventive Services Task Force that provides the health care professionals with resources and support so that they can raise this awareness among the pregnant women about the negative effects of tobacco use on the pregnancy, and counsel the pregnant women who smoke. However, many of these campaigns started to date have not proven effective in addressing the key issues. “All 31 sites [in the US] have met the Healthy People 2010 (HP 2010) objective of increasing the percentage of pregnant smokers who stop smoking during pregnancy to 30%; site-specific quit rates in 2005 ranged from 30.2% to 61.0%. However, none of the sites achieved the HP 2010 objective of reducing the prevalence of prenatal smoking to 1%” (Tong, 2009). This speaks of the inadequacy of the current interventions to obtain the goal of Healthy People made in the year 2010. “Similarly, within the U.S. subgroups of black, adolescent, and single mothers, among others, whose children are at increased risk for obesity, rates of breast-feeding exclusively at 3 months of age are under 20% — much lower than the Healthy People 2010 target of 60%” (Wojcicki and Heyman, 2010). Childhood Obesity in the UK The prevalence of childhood obesity in the UK The situation of childhood obesity in the UK is comparatively less daunting than it is in the US. According to the National Child Measurement Programme, the percentage of the overweight or obese 11-year-olds in the UK is more than 33 whereas almost 22 per cent of the four to five year old children in the UK are overweight or obese (Winterman, 2012). According to the survey of National Child Measurement Programme, the percentages are almost the same all across the UK including the Scotland, Wales, England, and Northern Ireland. Causes of childhood obesity in the UK According to the obesity experts, the main reason of prevalence of childhood obesity in the UK is lack of awareness and education of the parents regarding what is healthy food for their children. Other factors that have contributed to the problem include but are not limited to limited cooking skills of the parents at home, lack of money to buy healthier food, and omnipresence of the campaigns that market junk foods for the kids. Campaigns to combat childhood obesity in the UK Like the US, several campaigns have been launched in the UK in the past decade to overcome childhood obesity. Recently, a major campaign was launched by the Academy of Medical Royal College (AoMRC) whose main objective was to reduce the prevalence of childhood obesity in the UK. A poster campaign was launched by the British Heart Foundation that displayed the images of burgers with gristle and bones to discourage junk food consumption in the children and raise awareness among them. “The campaign follows a survey conducted by the BHF, which found that over a third of eight to fourteen-year-olds surveyed did not know that chips were made from potatoes” (4ni.co.uk, 2012). Experts’ opinion on childhood obesity in the UK In spite of the rise in the prevalence of childhood obesity in the UK over the past few decades, experts deem it wrong to hold just the parents accountable for this. The professor of exercise and obesity, Paul Gately from the Leeds Metropolitan University says about parents, “They definitely have a responsibility, but the issue is much broader than simply blaming them. A lot of it is because the images of obesity that we see in the media are people who are massive, 30 stone (190kg) or above. This is what a lot of people think of as being overweight, but they are extreme cases. It only takes a few extra pounds to actually be overweight” (Gately cited in Winterman, 2012). According to Dr. Helen Walters who serves in the UK Faculty of Public Health, the prevalence of childhood obesity in the UK is decreasing but it would take a long time for the vulnerability of the children in the UK to obesity to decrease; “The situation will take decades to sort out and, as it stands, the picture remains bleak. Children all across the country need access to safe outdoor places to play sports in, opportunities for safe active travel such as cycling or walking to school, and access to a good diet through healthy school meals and availability of cheap fruit and vegetables” (Walters cited in Campbell, 2010). Comparison of childhood obesity statistics in the US and the UK According to the National Obesity Observatory (2009), the prevalence of obesity in boys in England aged 5 to 17 years in 2004 was 29 per cent whereas for the girls of the same age group in England, the prevalence was 29.3 per cent whereas the prevalence of obesity in boys aged 6 to 17 years in the US in 2003 was 35.1 per cent whereas the prevalence for the girls of the same age group in the US in 2003 was 36 per cent. Childhood obesity constitutes a significant portion of the total costs of health care in both the US and the UK. “A CDC study estimated that the medical costs of treating obesity-related diseases in the United states (Us) were as high as $147 billion (?738 million) in 2008 [whereas] in the United Kingdom (UK), it is estimated that the current costs of obesity will double by 2050” (london.gov.uk, n.d., p. 1). Conclusion Comparison of the prevalence of childhood obesity in the US and the UK suggests that the problem is graver in the former as compared to the latter. Statistics noted in this paper show that in both the countries, the prevalence of obesity among girls between 5 and 17 years of age has been higher as compared to the boys of the same age group. Although the statistics slightly differ between the two countries, yet both the US and the UK face a lot of challenges with respect to childhood obesity and have to go a long way before the problem can be completely eliminated from the society. However, a detailed investigation of the campaigns, programs, and strategies implemented in both the countries suggests that both the US and the UK have prioritized the elimination of childhood obesity from the society as is evident from the campaigns initiated as well as the cost of health care in general and the treatment of childhood obesity in particular, and are taking serious measures to achieve this goal. Word Count: [2065]. References: 4ni.co.uk 2012, Poster campaign to target child obesity, viewed 14 December 2012 at http://www.4ni.co.uk/northern_ireland_news.asp?id=45750. Campbell, D 2010, NHS child obesity figures show a third are overweight by year six, The Guardian, viewed 14 December 2012 at http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2010/dec/15/nhs-child-obesity. letsmove.gov n.d., Learn The Facts, viewed 14 December 2012 at http://www.letsmove.gov/learn-facts/epidemic-childhood-obesity. london.gov.uk n.d., A Tale of Two ObesCities: Comparing responses to childhood obesity in London and New York City, viewed 14 December 2012 at http://www.london.gov.uk/sites/default/files/a-tale-of-two-obescities.pdf. National Obesity Observatory 2009, International comparisons of obesity prevalence, viewed 14 December 2012 at http://www.noo.org.uk/uploads/doc799_2_International_Comparisons_Obesity_Prevalence2.pdf. Ogden, CL, Carroll, MD, Kit, BK, and Flegal, KM 2012, Prevalence of Obesity in the United States, 2009–2010, viewed 14 December 2012 at http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/databriefs/db82.pdf. Tong, V 2009, Trends in Smoking Before, During, and After Pregnancy --- Pregnancy Risk Assessment Monitoring System (PRAMS), United States, 31 Sites, 2000—2005, CDC, viewed 14 December 2012 at http://www.cdc.gov/MMWR/preview/mmwrhtml/ss5804a1.htm. Winterman, D 2012, Child obesity: Why do parents let their kids get fat?, BBC News Magazine, viewed 14 December 2012 at http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-19661085. Wojcicki, JM, and Heyman, MB 2010, Let's Move — Childhood Obesity Prevention from Pregnancy and Infancy Onward, The New England Journal of Medicine, Vol. 362, pp. 1457-1459, viewed 14 December 2012 at http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp1001857. Wrotniak, BH, Shults, J, Butts, S, and Stettler, N 2008, Gestational weight gain and risk of overweight in the offspring at age 7 y in a multicenter, multiethnic cohort study, The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, Vol. 87, No. 6, pp. 1818-1824, viewed 14 December 2012 at http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18541573. Read More