Salud America! Targets Latino Child Obesity During Nat’l Childhood Obesity Awareness Month
Sep 2nd
Salud America! The RWJF Research Network to Prevent Obesity Among Latino Children, which is led by the Institute for Health Promotion Research at The UT Health Science Center at San Antonio, is observing National Childhood Obesity Awareness Month and encouraging people to join us and get involved.
Earlier this year, a resolution was unanimously passed in both the U.S. House of Representatives and the Senate designating September as National Childhood Obesity Awareness Month, to bring attention to this growing epidemic.
Mexican-American children are more likely to be obese or overweight (38%) than children overall (31.9%), putting them at greater risk for chronic disease and shorter lifespans.
In repsonse, Salud America! formed in 2008 to increase the number of researchers, policy-makers and community leaders engaged in research to prevent obesity among Latino children. We have:
- Developed a network of more than 1,600 people interested in preventing Latino childhood obesity.
- Developed first National Latino Child Obesity Research Agenda.
- Funded, through the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, 20 pilot research projects working in and with Latino communities on a variety of nutrition, physical activity and policy issues.
- Developed the SaludToday Web site and blog to spread positive Latino health stories and messages.
And we’ve also produced an award-winning dramatic video that uses shocking statistics and actual child voices to document the multi-faceted epidemic of Latino childhood obesity, “Did You Know?/¿Sabía Usted?”
Just the Facts: Obesity Among Latino Youths
Aug 25th
Leadership for Healthy Communities, a national program of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, has updated its Overweight and Obesity Among Latino Youths fact sheets, which highlights the prevalence, consequences and causes of overweight and obesity among Latino youths, in both English and Spanish.
While childhood obesity has increased significantly throughout the general population, children from minority communities have been disproportionately affected.
Sharply higher rates of overweight and obesity have occurred among Latino, African-American and Native American children and adolescents.
We at SaludToday hope you read the fact sheet and get motivated to do something about it.
Latinos, Get More Obesity News in Spanish from RWJF
Aug 20th
The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) has launched its Multicultural Newsroom, a dynamic online resource that aims to provide extensive health-related information for anyone involved in improving the health and health care of African-Americans and Latinos in the U.S.
Through a multicultural lens and bilingual messaging, the site presents information, images and videos on the RWJF work under way in African-American and Latino communities across the country, such as:
- Profiles of key leaders, programs and projects that RWJF supports in these communities
- RWJF news releases, fact sheets and research findings that are of particular relevance to African-Americans and Latinos.
- Speeches, commentary and discussion by RWJF leaders and experts on issues such as disparities in health care, reversing the childhood obesity epidemic and the impact of social factors on health.
We encourage you to give www.rwjf.org/multicultural a look and listen. It’s an important resource for anyone involved in improving the health and health care of African-Americans and Latinos in the U.S.
Texans, You Can Weigh in on Obesity-Reduction Efforts
Aug 19th
Texas adults are the 15th-most obese in the nation and 40% of Texas children are overweight or obese, which can lead to serious health concerns and increased health care costs.
Obesity is a multi-faceted problem and will require a comprehensive, collaborative systems change approach involving families, workplaces, schools, communities, organizations, business and industry, academic institutions, and local and state governments.
Salud America! The RWJF Research Network to Prevent Obesity Among Latino Children is among the initiatives in the state that are addressing the burden of obesity.
CPRIT invites comments on the following questions:
- Given current efforts in Texas that address obesity research, prevention, and control, where are the gaps? What other evidence, research, programs, or services are needed to fill these gaps?
- Given CPRIT’s mission to fund innovation in cancer prevention and research, what unique niche, if any, should CPRIT attempt to fill?
You are invited to e-mail an answer to these questions (no longer than one page) to RFI@cprit.state.tx.us by Sept. 20, 2010. All ideas submitted will be reviewed by and distributed to CPRIT program staff and advisory groups. CPRIT will use these ideas to consider its role in addressing the burden of obesity in Texas.
Obesity Rate Stabilizes Among Latino Youth, Rises or Drops for Others
Aug 16th
Obesity rates among Latino youth leveled off at 26 percent from 2001-2008, according to a new study released today in Pediatrics that reveals the very mixed trends in racial disparities that underlie a plateau in childhood obesity rates nationally.
The study, which examined data from more than 8 million California students (about half Latinos), is the first to find significant differences in racial and ethnic trends over time for obesity prevalence among youth.
From 2001 to 2008 in California, obesity rates increased steadily among Black and American Indian girls to 22 percent and 23 percent, resectively, compared with fluctuating rates for Black and American Indian boys. And among White and Asian children, rates fell starting in 2005 to 12 percent and 13 percent, respectively. The overall obesity rate for the groups was 20 percent.
The study also found the greatest racial disparities among California’s most obese children. American Indian and Black girls were more than three times as likely as White girls to be in the highest obesity percentile.
“The stabilization of obesity among Latinos is encouraging, but Latino youth still have the highest rates of overweight and obesity in the state,” said lead author Kristine Madsen, M.D., MPH, of the University of California, San Francisco. “As our country becomes increasingly diverse, it’s critical that we act quickly to address these disparities.”
Researchers analyzed data from more than 8 million fifth-, seventh- and ninth-grade students, collected between 2001 and 2008 as part of California’s mandatory school-based body mass index (BMI) screening program. About one in eight U.S. children lives in California, and the study’s authors suggest these results show population-level trends that are applicable to other states.
The study, “Disparities in Peaks, Plateaus, and Declines in Prevalence of High BMI Among Adolescents,” was supported by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation through its national program, Active Living Research.
Tackling Obesity in the Southern U.S.
Aug 13th
If you’re doing work to prevent and reduce obesity in the Southern U.S., you can be a part of the effort to develop a Southern Obesity Strategy, envisioned as a systematic way for individuals and organizations from the South to connect in a peer network focused around common themes and ideas.
Community groups and other working to reduce obesity are invited to take this short survey by Aug. 20, 2010, which help set up the foundation for a Southern Obesity Strategy. Led by the Texas Health Institute, this survey will collect information on the active obesity initiatives at the community level in the 16 states that will be represented at the Southern Obesity Summit (SOS) in Atlanta from September 12-14. At the Summit, we will start the conference by presenting the results of this survey. Throughout the event, participants will use its results, especially during sessions where we build the future structure for collaborating between the southern states.
On Nov. 1, 2010, a report of the survey results and our planned activities will be presented to First Lady Michelle Obama.
Last Chance to Weigh in on Ideas to Reverse Childhood Obesity Epidemic
Aug 11th
More P.E. classes in schools? Taxes on snacks and sodas? The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) is issuing a last call for suggestions on the best ways to reverse the childhood obesity epidemic.
Share your thoughts in RWJF’s online forum, where our program officers are leading discussions about ensuring nutritious foods in schools, building more sidewalks and bike lanes, restricting food marketing, and unlocking school gyms and blacktops for community use outside of school hours.
Give us your two cents before the forum ends this Monday, Aug. 16, 2010.
More than 100 comments have been posted so far, with the topic of physical fitness in schools attracting the liveliest discussion. But what about other strategies, such as:
- Making certain foods and drinks cheaper—fruits, vegetables and water, for instance—to shift consumption from the high-fat, high-sugar stuff;
- banning french fries from school cafeterias—and cupcakes from classroom parties; or
- dispatching mobile recreation vans, filled with balls, jump ropes and other fun, to communities with little access to parks and programs.
RWJF has committed $500 million to reverse childhood obesity by 2015. The more input we receive on our policy priorities, the better chance we have of achieving that goal. Tell us what you think, what you see as the best strategies. Just be sure to do so by Aug. 16!
San Antonio Medical/Nursing Students Teach Healthy Choices to Latino Kids
Jul 15th
About 20 Latino middle-school students from the Good Samaritan Community Center Summer Day Camp went to a farmers market on San Antonio’s West Side recently to learn about healthy food choices from medical students as part of a program at The University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio.
The program, Healthy Choices for Kids, for Latino children ages 10-14 from low-income families, doubles as an interprofessional elective course for university nursing and medical students. The students design a health curriculum and teach it at Good Samaritan Community Center and Krueger Middle School.
The student-designed curriculum teaches kids how to make healthy decisions regarding fitness, nutrition and healthy relationships, with the goal of reducing obesity, diabetes, violence and teen pregnancy.
The camp includes positive youth development, exercise, healthy lifestyle choices, goal setting, bullying/anger management and sexual abstinence.
At the farmers market, the children learned that eating more fresh fruits and vegetables can combat childhood obesity, and that fresh produce is available for a reasonable price in their area of town. The children were each given $2 to buy fruit.
“They purchased some fruit and then went back to the center and made healthy smoothies to demonstrate different ways fruits can be used in the diet,” said Dr. Adelita G. Cantu, assistant professor of chronic nursing care, who teaches the elective course with Dr. Ruth Berggren, director of the Center for Medical Humanities & Ethics at the Health Science Center.
Read more about the program here.
Most Texas School Kids Failing in Recess
Jul 5th
More than two-thirds of Texas schoolchildren flunked the state’s physical fitness test this year, a troubling trend that doctors worry could worsen with the Legislature loosening the requirements for high school gym class, the Houston Chronicle reports.
The bright spot among the newly released state data involves elementary and middle school students, who met the healthy benchmarks at slightly higher rates than they did two years ago when Texas became the first state to mandate annual fitness testing.
Third-grade girls continued to perform the best this year, with 37 percent passing all six tests, which involve running, strength and flexibility exercises and a body fat measure.
High school seniors did the worst, with about 8 percent of each gender meeting the standard.
Part of the problem is that today’s lifestyles are very different than a generation ago, said Laura Esparza, a researcher at the Institute for Health Promotion Research at the UT Health Science Center at San Antonio, the team behind SaludToday.
Laura Esparza
“We have essentially engineered physical activity out of our lives—most kids ride to school (cars, buses) instead of walk, many kids do not spend time playing outside in their free time, instead they stay inside and watch TV and play video games—the cumulative result is kids are less active and less physically fit,” Esparza said. “We need to be sure to support efforts to improve the quality of physical education offered to high school kids as well as the variety of activities offered. We also should support efforts outside of school to educate kids and their parents about the many benefits of a physically active lifestyle.”
One current program that aims to change these numbers is the IHPR’s unique collaboration with Girls Scouts.
Led by Dr. Deborah Parra-Medina and Esparza, the collaboration is bringing together Girl Scouts, parents and community leaders to collect information and discover the enablers and barriers to physical activity among Latina girls ages 11-14. The researchers will use this information to devise new strategies to get girls moving. They plan to use low-cost mobile and wireless technology, like text-messaging.
“Regular activity, in school and out, is what will change those fitness numbers,” Esparza said.
‘F as in Fat’: Obesity Rises in 28 States; Rates Higher in Latinos, Blacks
Jun 29th
The U.S. obesity epidemic continues to worsen as adult obesity rates climbed in 28 states in the past year—now exceeding 25 percent in more than two-thirds of the states—with rates higher among blacks and Latinos than whites in 40 states, according to the new F as in Fat 2010 report.
Among the report’s findings are that Latino adult obesity rates were above 35 percent in two states (North Dakota and Tennessee) and at 30 percent and above in 19 states.
Obesity rates in Texas were the 13th-highest in the nation.
The report, by Trust for America’s Health (TFAH) and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF), goes on to discuss how the nation’s response has yet to fully match the magnitude of the problem. At the same time, it highlights public recognition of the issue and acute concern over the prevalence of childhood obesity.
The report suggests ways to ensure that the disease-prevention measures in the new health reform law are implemented most strategically to help prevent and reduce obesity.
Other recommendations include expanding the commitment to community-based prevention programs and sustaining investments in research and evaluation.