In our efforts to promote children’s health and wellness, we need to ensure that they grow up at a healthy weight. Preventing children from being overweight or obese requires action in the earliest years since experts agree that reversing these trends later in life can be very difficult. It is currently estimated that one in four children are overweight or obese by the time they enter kindergarten.
Racial and ethnic minorities and those families who are poor are at higher risk of being overweight or obese. These trends are linked to social, environmental and economic disparities. Additionally, research about exposure to trauma in the early years links adverse childhood experiences to both physical and mental health challenges later in life, including the increased risk of living at an unhealthy weight. Addressing underlying causes of obesity early in children’s lives, by ensuring their environments support safe, stable, nurturing relationships that foster good nutrition and adequate physical activity is a critical step to promote healthy lifelong weight.
[For more of this story go to http://www.chdi.org/index.php/...-grow-healthy-weight]
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