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Child Obesity Bill
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Topic Started: Jan 19 2005, 09:31 PM (190 Views)
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Sophie
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Jan 19 2005, 09:31 PM
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Keeper of the spider-cats
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What do you think of this?
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AUSTIN, Texas - Texas school districts would be required to include the body mass index of students as part of their regular report cards under a bill introduced Tuesday by a lawmaker seeking to link healthy minds with healthy bodies. When the measurement, which calculates body fat based on height and weight, indicates a student is overweight, the school would provide parents with information about links between increased body fat and health problems, said Democratic state Sen. Leticia Van de Putte. "We should be just as concerned with students' physical health and performance as we are with their academic performance," she said. More than a third of school-age children in Texas are overweight or obese, according to the Texas Department of Agriculture. Arkansas implemented a similar law during the 2003-2004 school year, although the information is sent to parents separately from report cards. Eric Allen, a spokesman for the Association for Texas Professional Educators, said most parents don't need to be told their child is overweight. "It doesn't have a place on a report card," he said. http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=stor...mb&sid=95832459SUNDAY, Jan. 2 (HealthDay) -- The American Heart Association (news - web sites)'s warning last week that more children than ever are heading toward heart trouble is primarily due to the nation's obesity epidemic. But the damage caused by too much weight isn't limited to the heart. In its annual assessment of cardiovascular disease, the top killer in the United States, the AHA reported that about 1 million children between 12 and 19 years old, or about 4.2 percent, now have metabolic syndrome. This is an umbrella term for a host of controllable risk factors for heart disease such as abnormal blood lipids, high blood sugar, high blood pressure, and overweight or obesity. However, those same teens may also be flirting with another health condition called insulin resistance, which is also marked by obesity. Insulin resistance is closely related to a condition called Syndrome X and to metabolic syndrome. In fact, all three terms are so similar they are often used synonymously. The notion of Syndrome X -- a constellation of insidious symptoms characterized by the body's inability to use insulin or blood sugar -- was first proposed in 1988 by Dr. Gerald M. Reaven, an endocrinology professor at Stanford Medical School. The bad news is that the effects of insulin resistance now appear to be under way much earlier in life than had previously been suspected. Teenagers are beginning to be seen with insulin resistance, a condition that had been relegated largely to people twice their age. This isn't entirely a surprise in view of the widely reported epidemic of obesity among the nation's youth. But if baby fat is somehow associated with serious illness -- and research indicates this is so -- it portends a grim future for America's children. Insulin resistance accounts for many of the interlocking serious side effects that often spin off from obesity. These include type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, and the ravages of bad cholesterol (LDL), which can all lead to heart disease. Diabetes, which can make heart disease worse, has its own set of terrible complications, such as blindness and amputations. Adults with diabetes are two to four times more likely to have heart disease or a stroke than adults without diabetes. The fact that insulin resistance was already at work in teenagers was reported in October by a group led by Dr. Alan Sinaiko, a professor of pediatrics at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis. "This study shows that insulin resistance is present at a very young age," Sinaiko said. "Even though children don't have the same degree of heart risk factors as adults, the findings suggest that insulin resistance has an early influence on what happens to people as adults." According to the American Heart Association, more than 60 million Americans have insulin resistance. One in four of them will develop type 2 diabetes. The term "resistance" comes from the resistance of the body's cells to respond properly to even high levels of insulin. This can lead to the glucose build-up in the blood that is the hallmark of type 2 diabetes. By monitoring teenagers every five years, Sinaiko and his colleagues found that insulin resistance was associated with higher systolic blood pressure and obesity. It was also associated with more ominous levels of cholesterol and other lipids. The study participants were 357 healthy children recruited through the Minneapolis school system whose average age was 13 when the research began. Over the next 5.5 years, all the teens had three evaluations of their body's response to insulin: at enrollment, at age 15 and at age 19. At the start, none of the participants had high blood pressure, and the average blood pressure for the study group was 109/55 mm Hg in 198 boys and 106/58 mm Hg in 159 girls. Recent federal guidelines set an acceptable standard of 115/75 mm Hg for adults. By age 19, blood pressure was higher, as one would expect in older kids, but it had an extra rise for each unit of insulin resistance and another boost for each unit increase in body mass index, the standard measurement of obesity. Sinaiko said that a key to preventing high blood pressure is to start thinking about it in childhood. "By the time people are in their 20s and 30s, a lot of the risk is already set, and we are treating the disease instead of preventing it," he noted. Testing for insulin resistance is a complicated and expensive procedure not commonly available in doctors' offices. Doctors use a technique called the euglycemic clamp -- infusing a small amount of insulin into the blood for three hours while glucose is infused through another vein. The link between insulin resistance and teenagers is only a new wrinkle in the campaign by some heart researchers to tie the start of coronary heart disease to dietary habits in children as young as 3. A study of Louisiana youngsters, called the Bogalusa Heart Study and first reported in 1991 by Dr. Gerald S. Berenson and his colleagues at Tulane University School of Public Health, found grossly visible fatty streaks in the aortas of children after age 3 and in the coronary arteries beginning after age 10.
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somerled
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Jan 19 2005, 09:52 PM
Post #2
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Admiral MacDonald RN
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- T'Lac
- Jan 19 2005, 09:31 PM
linkWhat do you think of this? - Quote:
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AUSTIN, Texas - Texas school districts would be required to include the body mass index of students as part of their regular report cards under a bill introduced Tuesday by a lawmaker seeking to link healthy minds with healthy bodies. When the measurement, which calculates body fat based on height and weight, indicates a student is overweight, the school would provide parents with information about links between increased body fat and health problems, said Democratic state Sen. Leticia Van de Putte. "We should be just as concerned with students' physical health and performance as we are with their academic performance," she said. More than a third of school-age children in Texas are overweight or obese, according to the Texas Department of Agriculture. Arkansas implemented a similar law during the 2003-2004 school year, although the information is sent to parents separately from report cards. Eric Allen, a spokesman for the Association for Texas Professional Educators, said most parents don't need to be told their child is overweight. "It doesn't have a place on a report card," he said. http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=stor...mb&sid=95832459SUNDAY, Jan. 2 (HealthDay) -- The American Heart Association (news - web sites)'s warning last week that more children than ever are heading toward heart trouble is primarily due to the nation's obesity epidemic. But the damage caused by too much weight isn't limited to the heart. In its annual assessment of cardiovascular disease, the top killer in the United States, the AHA reported that about 1 million children between 12 and 19 years old, or about 4.2 percent, now have metabolic syndrome. This is an umbrella term for a host of controllable risk factors for heart disease such as abnormal blood lipids, high blood sugar, high blood pressure, and overweight or obesity. However, those same teens may also be flirting with another health condition called insulin resistance, which is also marked by obesity. Insulin resistance is closely related to a condition called Syndrome X and to metabolic syndrome. In fact, all three terms are so similar they are often used synonymously. The notion of Syndrome X -- a constellation of insidious symptoms characterized by the body's inability to use insulin or blood sugar -- was first proposed in 1988 by Dr. Gerald M. Reaven, an endocrinology professor at Stanford Medical School. The bad news is that the effects of insulin resistance now appear to be under way much earlier in life than had previously been suspected. Teenagers are beginning to be seen with insulin resistance, a condition that had been relegated largely to people twice their age. This isn't entirely a surprise in view of the widely reported epidemic of obesity among the nation's youth. But if baby fat is somehow associated with serious illness -- and research indicates this is so -- it portends a grim future for America's children. Insulin resistance accounts for many of the interlocking serious side effects that often spin off from obesity. These include type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, and the ravages of bad cholesterol (LDL), which can all lead to heart disease. Diabetes, which can make heart disease worse, has its own set of terrible complications, such as blindness and amputations. Adults with diabetes are two to four times more likely to have heart disease or a stroke than adults without diabetes. The fact that insulin resistance was already at work in teenagers was reported in October by a group led by Dr. Alan Sinaiko, a professor of pediatrics at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis. "This study shows that insulin resistance is present at a very young age," Sinaiko said. "Even though children don't have the same degree of heart risk factors as adults, the findings suggest that insulin resistance has an early influence on what happens to people as adults." According to the American Heart Association, more than 60 million Americans have insulin resistance. One in four of them will develop type 2 diabetes. The term "resistance" comes from the resistance of the body's cells to respond properly to even high levels of insulin. This can lead to the glucose build-up in the blood that is the hallmark of type 2 diabetes. By monitoring teenagers every five years, Sinaiko and his colleagues found that insulin resistance was associated with higher systolic blood pressure and obesity. It was also associated with more ominous levels of cholesterol and other lipids. The study participants were 357 healthy children recruited through the Minneapolis school system whose average age was 13 when the research began. Over the next 5.5 years, all the teens had three evaluations of their body's response to insulin: at enrollment, at age 15 and at age 19. At the start, none of the participants had high blood pressure, and the average blood pressure for the study group was 109/55 mm Hg in 198 boys and 106/58 mm Hg in 159 girls. Recent federal guidelines set an acceptable standard of 115/75 mm Hg for adults. By age 19, blood pressure was higher, as one would expect in older kids, but it had an extra rise for each unit of insulin resistance and another boost for each unit increase in body mass index, the standard measurement of obesity. Sinaiko said that a key to preventing high blood pressure is to start thinking about it in childhood. "By the time people are in their 20s and 30s, a lot of the risk is already set, and we are treating the disease instead of preventing it," he noted. Testing for insulin resistance is a complicated and expensive procedure not commonly available in doctors' offices. Doctors use a technique called the euglycemic clamp -- infusing a small amount of insulin into the blood for three hours while glucose is infused through another vein. The link between insulin resistance and teenagers is only a new wrinkle in the campaign by some heart researchers to tie the start of coronary heart disease to dietary habits in children as young as 3. A study of Louisiana youngsters, called the Bogalusa Heart Study and first reported in 1991 by Dr. Gerald S. Berenson and his colleagues at Tulane University School of Public Health, found grossly visible fatty streaks in the aortas of children after age 3 and in the coronary arteries beginning after age 10.
How is this going to help ?
Do kids at school in the USA still do PE and have sports afternoons ?
Banning candy, chips, cordials and other junk food from caffeterias and vending machines from schools would be more effective.
(PE is physical education - stuff like exercising, and running about, jumping about activities for 3 or 4 periods a week).
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Sophie
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Jan 19 2005, 09:55 PM
Post #3
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Keeper of the spider-cats
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- somerled
- Jan 19 2005, 08:52 PM
Do kids at school in the USA still do PE and have sports afternoons ?
yes, for 45 minutes to one hour.
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somerled
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Jan 19 2005, 10:42 PM
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Admiral MacDonald RN
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- T'Lac
- Jan 19 2005, 09:55 PM
- somerled
- Jan 19 2005, 08:52 PM
Do kids at school in the USA still do PE and have sports afternoons ?
yes, for 45 minutes to one hour.
In a week ? No longer ? no wonder the kids are getting fat and unfit.
My kids do 4 hours of sport per week at school, along with 2 double periods (a period is 40 minutes) of PE per week at school, PE is compulsory as is sport. The school day - compulsory - is 9am to 3:15pm Monday to Friday.
My kids also engage in sports outside school - my eldest is a gymnast (he's a regular senior state representative at MAG elite levels and will be competing at the Commonwealth Games next year) and he also does marshal-arts (now he is over 18), my daughter plays netball and soccer and likes dancing (all kinds, she's bloody good at it too and has won lots of awards) , my youngest likes tennis and athletics (he's a runner) and surfing and fishing with his mates (no longer cool to fish with dad
he'll be back, and he uses my gear) , and they have all been dancers since my wife and I are regular social dancers (square dance) and they grew up with it. We all ride push bikes regularly - weather permitting.
But enough of my skiting about my kids sporting and physical skills. They do all these things because they want too, I'm just the financier and taxi and part of the barracing squad when they are competing.
But kids here tend to like and get into sports and outside activities since our climate is so nice all year round.
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Sophie
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Jan 19 2005, 10:52 PM
Post #5
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Keeper of the spider-cats
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- somerled
- Jan 19 2005, 09:42 PM
- T'Lac
- Jan 19 2005, 09:55 PM
- somerled
- Jan 19 2005, 08:52 PM
Do kids at school in the USA still do PE and have sports afternoons ?
yes, for 45 minutes to one hour.
In a week ? No longer ? no wonder the kids are getting fat and unfit.
2 or 3 days a week.
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somerled
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Jan 19 2005, 11:15 PM
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Admiral MacDonald RN
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- T'Lac
- Jan 19 2005, 10:52 PM
- somerled
- Jan 19 2005, 09:42 PM
- T'Lac
- Jan 19 2005, 09:55 PM
- somerled
- Jan 19 2005, 08:52 PM
Do kids at school in the USA still do PE and have sports afternoons ?
yes, for 45 minutes to one hour.
In a week ? No longer ? no wonder the kids are getting fat and unfit.
2 or 3 days a week.
That's better , but not even enough for them to warm up properly.
My eldest takes an hour or more to limber up before training, my daughter runs and stretches for an hour prior to playing or dancing comps or training to warm up.
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Admiralbill_gomec
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Jan 20 2005, 12:03 AM
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UberAdmiral
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The first post in this thread discussed adding the BMI of each student to their report cards.
Pity we can't list the BMI of this idiocy's sponsor, Leticia Van de Putte. Well over 30.
Here's her bio, with head shot:
http://www.ncsl.org/programs/press/bio_vandeputte.htm
(Texans might know this one from her brief moment of fame as one of eleven Texas Senate Democrats who hid in New Mexico to keep the Texas Senate from voting on redistricting in 2003.)
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somerled
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Jan 20 2005, 05:39 AM
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Admiral MacDonald RN
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- Admiralbill_gomec
- Jan 20 2005, 12:03 AM
The first post in this thread discussed adding the BMI of each student to their report cards. Pity we can't list the BMI of this idiocy's sponsor, Leticia Van de Putte. Well over 30. Here's her bio, with head shot: http://www.ncsl.org/programs/press/bio_vandeputte.htm(Texans might know this one from her brief moment of fame as one of eleven Texas Senate Democrats who hid in New Mexico to keep the Texas Senate from voting on redistricting in 2003.)
Looks like a nice lady.
You'll have to be specific on your beef with her for us foreigners who aren't up to speed with texan politics. You aren't inferring that she is very fat and so should not be worried about kids becoming fat ?
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Admiralbill_gomec
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Jan 20 2005, 07:59 AM
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UberAdmiral
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She's a fat chick who demands the BMI be listed on kid's report cards, but this doesn't seem to apply to her.
Okay?
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Hoss
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Jan 20 2005, 08:07 AM
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Don't make me use my bare hands on you.
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I heard about this on the local news yesterday. Yet another thing for the schools to waste time and money on so that they can avoid academics. Geeze, the schools are not medical clinics, they are not restaurants, they are not day cares, they are not even good at being schools. Isn't there anything that parents must be responsible for? Why is it that some people want to pervert the schools into child rearing institutions that don't teach math, history, english and science?
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somerled
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Jan 20 2005, 08:11 AM
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Admiral MacDonald RN
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- Admiralbill_gomec
- Jan 20 2005, 07:59 AM
She's a fat chick who demands the BMI be listed on kid's report cards, but this doesn't seem to apply to her.
Okay?
Oh. I see. She's fat so she is not entitled to suggest to others to avoid getting fat themselves.
Is it because she is fat that you don't like her, or what she has to say, or is it because of her political affilitations ?
I would think since she knows first had what it is like to be fat , she's well qualified to propose such things , maybe better qualified than some fitness fanatic who's a string beam and has never been unlucky enough to be fat.
She's probably onto something when all is said and done.
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Admiralbill_gomec
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Jan 20 2005, 10:41 AM
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UberAdmiral
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No, it has to do with her being another nanny-stater who wants to legislate feel good policies that do no good. You don't think a fat kid knows he's fat?
As for her, I'd consider Jenny Craig before I opened my mouth about telling other people they are fat.
Mr. Pot, meet Ms. Kettle.
Still, I think her being a nanny-stater has a certain appeal to you, Somerled. You're probably thinking "Oh thank Gaia that someone has the solutions to all of our problems and even if it doesn't do anything I know she meant well." We all know you are a "baby with the bathwater" type, but you don't have to keep showing us. I can only laugh so much before I hyperventilate!
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Dr. Noah
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Jan 20 2005, 10:55 AM
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Sistertrek's Asian Correspondant
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OK, to add some balance to this discussion,
I agree that obesity is becoming a growing problem in children these days. There are more overweight kids today in the US than ever. However, much of the responsibility for this weighs on parents, and NOT THE SCHOOLS!!
As someone who worked in the education system, I have to say that teachers are really, really, sick and tired of raising kids at school for thier parents. Kids whose parents apparently never bothered to teach them manners, or how to treat other people, or to respect adults and/or authority. Again, this seems like another responsibility to lay on an underpaid overworked position.
That said, it is partly the state's responsibility to make sure the schools have adequate funding so they don't have to make corporate deals to allow junkfood to be dealt to kids instead of nutritious meals. More and more, Pizza Hut, Taco Bell, and other fast food entities are making appearances in school lunchrooms.
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Admiralbill_gomec
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Jan 20 2005, 11:12 AM
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UberAdmiral
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There were candy machines and coke machines when I was in high school. I can think of maybe two kids in my graduating class (of 677) that one would consider fat by yesterday's or today's standards.
One problem IS the lack of phys ed classes. I had to take this class every day of the week. When I moved to Houston and its longer classes, it was an hour. Every day. Now it is maybe three times a week if lucky. I also played on the baseball team, so I had practice too.
Another problem is the sedentary lifestyle of kids at home. They sit at home and play X-Box or spend their time in on-line chatrooms. They should be playing outside.
It really isn't "unhealthy food" served in school. I remember the menus, even though it was 27 years ago. The meals were pretty balanced, even if you got the dreaded beefaroni (barfaroni, as we called it). It came with a vegetable or two and milk. You could buy a soda... you could buy candy, but most had one of the two with lunch, not as a substitute for lunch. Lunch, including milk cost 50 cents. The traditional lunch was one meat, one or two starches (bread), two vegetables, and you could get dessert (jello or jello salad). It was pretty plain, but not bad. I covered this for a ficticious article for the school paper (for April Fools Day) entitled, "What's on the Menu?" The article photographer took pictures of Drano and rat poison labels and ran them through the Xerox machine, and we pasted them on cans of food, had two of the cafeteria ladies in rubber gloves and surgical masks. It was fun.
My only complaint with cafeteria food was their use of canned vegetables. If you've ever been to a wholesale club, you've seen the one gallon cans of green beans and corn, and the five gallon containers of salad dressing. But, when you have a budget...
So, getting back to the topic at hand, this is not the school's job. The school should be requiring PE of students (one thing I noticed when my son was in public school was the number of kids who had notes from their parents excusing them from PE class... and it was rarely for a medical excuse... it was usually because the kid didn't want to be embarrassed and lower his/her self-esteem) ever single day. Parents should not make excuses for their children like, "Eric is just big-boned" (thanks, Mrs. Cartman). Turn off the TV, unplug the X-box, and get the kid to a playground!
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Dr. Noah
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Jan 20 2005, 11:23 AM
Post #15
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Sistertrek's Asian Correspondant
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Too true. Sports should also be encouraged, but too often it becomes so competitive it's not about having fun and getting exercise anymore. The drive to workout is not an easy one to instill. Let's face it, working out is uncomfortable, sometimes, it's downright painful. But in order to be healthy, it's necessary.
I have to force myself sometimes to workout everyday. I don't always feel like it, and could easily make some excuse and sit around and watch Star Trek instead. The reason I can make myself do it is that I played sports in school, and had a coach to force me to push myself to my limits.
It's too easy to let kids off the hook in this regard, and that sets a pattern of obesity.
I too had soda machines in school, and I was a major soda junkie until I graduated from college. I finally burned myself out after drinking 2 liters of Pepsi everyday.
I also ate a lot of candy, but I worked out too. (Not to mention I was 20-something, so I pretty much ate whatever I wanted and as much as I wanted. Ah, those were the days.)
I guess the bottom line is of this rant that exercise is something that has to be instilled in kids young in order to set healthy patterns, and in short AB, I agree.
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