The Doughnut Generation

Turns out today is National Doughnut Day, which has a surprisingly rich history going back to the “doughboys” of World War I.  But as you’re savoring your history and perhaps a sugary snack, don’t forget that increases in our consumption of sugar and carbohydrates combined with a sedentary lifestyle is causing real problems with our health.  In fact, a 2005 study suggests one in ten deaths is related to obesity or physical inactivity.  That’s bad enough – but unless we make changes, it will be much worse for our kids’ generation.

The Institute of Medicine produced a sobering study in 2004 at the spike in childhood obesity: “Over the past three decades, the childhood obesity rate has more than doubled for preschool children aged 2-5 years and adolescents aged 12-19 years, and it has more than tripled for children aged 6-11.”  The reasons why are what you’d expect them to be, a combination of bad habits and bad environmental factors.  Under habits, you can chalk up less physical activity, more sedentary activities, more access to and purchases of fast food, sugary food and drinks instead of fruits and vegetables, and yes, those damn video games and TV. Under the environment, you can point to families who live in areas where there’s a poor selection of cost-effective healthy food, fewer fresh fruits and vegetables in general, stressed family budgets (why is it that the cheapest food is almost always junk food?), and in some cases school systems that are cutting out gym, outdoor exercise at recess and other opportunities to educate children on making healthy choices.  It’s no wonder that our growing childhood obesity problem is also a dramatic example of health care disparities by race and socio-economic status.

This isn’t just a social or mental health problem – although it certainly is both of those.  Obesity links directly some of the most expensive chronic diseases:  diabetes, hypertension, ultimately heart disease, weakened joints, sleep apnea and heart disease.  If it sounds like problems kids shouldn’t have to worry about, you’re right.  But the RAND Corporation did a study of the cost impact of obesity on health care, and found that it beat smoking and drinking – and that “Only 20 years aging has similarly-sized effects.”  Meaning the best analogue of the impact on health care costs and quality of life is to imagine the effect on your body of naturally aging from 30 to 50.

Fixing health care isn’t just confined to doctor’s offices and hospitals, but it’s no surprise that countries with better access to regular primary care are less likely to be overweight and obese than Americans.  Yes, even the French.

We know what to do here, but we have a hard time finding the money.  We’re talking healthy school lunch programs, gym classes, more focus on health and physical activity in school, tossing out the junk food machines that now seem to be in every elementary school.  Good parenting plays a huge role as well.  We don’t often talk about wellness and prevention programs – given the huge potential these cost-effective programs have for improving our health and bringing down costs, we should be talking about them all the time.

(Photo credit:  aprilandrandy on Flickr.)