A new report shows that obese adolescent Americans tend to carry their extra weight into adulthood. The nationally representative study of American youth showed that one in 12 teenagers became severely obese as they entered adulthood with some 100 pounds above their ideal weight. And nearly half the girls and more than a third of the boys who are obese as teenagers grew up to be obese adults with a high risk of developing heart disease, diabetes and certain types of cancers.
Penny Gordon-Larsen, a nutrition scientist at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, lead researcher said, “People with severe obesity suffer from potentially life-threatening problems…The prevention efforts that we’ve had in the past maybe have not been as successful as we would have liked them to be…We really need to prevent kids from becoming obese teenagers, and then prevent those teenagers from becoming severely obese adults.”
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also states that 9% of the total U.S. medical expenditures, amounting to $147 billion in 2008 went in to deal with overweight and obesity and related problems. Several states now have obesity rates of more than 30 percent, with Mississippi leading the pack at 34.4 percent of residents. Colorado, with the leanest population in the nation, still has an obesity rate of 18.6 percent. Worst according to Gordon-Larsen is that weight loss drugs come with tons of side effects and are not always effective. Surgeries, such as gastric bypass or banding, lets people shed more pounds, but are costly and potential complications. “Prevention is easier, because obesity is hard to treat,” she said.
The study used data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, which has followed thousands of kids from middle schools and high schools since the mid-1990s. It is a first of its kind. At the start of the study, 79 teens (about 1 percent) were considered severely obese. By 2009, 60 of those people (70.5 percent) were still severely obese in adulthood, the investigators found. Also by 2009, an additional 7.9 percent of those who hadn't been severely obese as teens were now classified as severely obese adults. Obese black girls had the highest risk of becoming severely obese later on. Authors suggest that girls should be the main target for obesity prevention.
The study appeared in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
Dr. Goutham Rao, clinical director of the Weight Management and Wellness Center at Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh said, “I wasn't especially surprised by the study's findings. Other research has also shown that weight during adolescence is very predictive of weight in adulthood.” He said habits do not change. “If you have a 3-year-old, it’s relatively easy to influence that child's eating habits because you provide all the food. With adolescents, it's much more complicated because they’re often making their own food and drink choices and their habits are more entrenched,” he added. He said an important way to curb obesity is to limit junk food. It is also important to try to have at least one parent eat dinner with your teenager most days of the week he added.
Dr. David Ludwig, director of the Optimal Weight for Life Program at Children's Hospital Boston also commended the findings saying, “This underscores the importance of addressing childhood obesity as an urgent issue and not a condition that kids can be expected to grow out of.”
The, the study co-authors were Chirayath Suchindran, professor of biostatistics, Kari North, associate professor of epidemiology, and Barry Popkin, professor of nutrition, all of the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health.
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