Dear future President,

Childhood obesity rates have tripled, with the rates of obese 6-11 year olds more than doubling!

Child obesity is increasing dramatically around the world. Throughout the country, childhood obesity has risen over 17 percent in the last decade. In young adults as well, such as students in high school all over the country! According to statistics posted on, (stateofobesity.org). Among high school students, out of 37 states, obesity rates have exceeded 15%, in 11 states & no state had below 10%.

Today, nearly a third of our youths is overweight or obese’ that’s more than 23 million children and teenagers. The term “obese” describes children and adolescents who have a BMI (body mass index) at, or above the 95th percentile for their gender and age, while “overweight” describes those with a BMI at, or above the 85th percentile, but below the 95th percentile. According to a website, (huffingtonpost.com), in 2013, 3% eat fast food everyday, 16% eat it several times a week, 28% eat it about once a week, 33% eat it once or twice a month, 15% eat it a few times a year, & 4% never eat fast food.

Children and adolescents aged 8-18 years spend, on average, more than six hours per day watching television, playing video games & using other types of media. Overweight adolescents aged 12-17 years consume between 700 to 1,000 more calories per day than what’s needed for the growth, physical activity and body function of a healthy weight teen. Over the course of 10 years, this excess can pack on 57 unnecessary pounds. According to an article by (www.nccor.org). “Preventing obesity during childhood is critical, because habits formed during youth frequently carry into adulthood; an obese 4 year old has a 20% chance of becoming obese as an adult, and an obese teenager has up to an 80% chance of becoming an obese adult.

Fast food has become a big role in obesity in children and adolescents. Fast food is normally open until 12:00 AM, people who work on night shift, get out of work and are hungry. There first instinct is to go to McDonald’s or a fast food chain, then go home and sleep. Which then the food sits in your body and becomes fat. After 8:00 pm, you should not eat because all of your food intake can not be burned off. Therefore, fast food chains should be closed at 8:00 pm or should be limited to a couple of fast food places in certain areas. Obesity can lead to other illnesses from chronic to acute, some very severe and deadly, such as diabetes, high blood pressure, Coronary Artery disease, Coronary Vascular disease, heart attack, stroke, and even cancer.

According to a survey, out of 10 people, all 10 people agree with how everyone as a community, as a state, as the United States that we should all change the ways of how people eat & how they choose to live their life, for the better! Big businesses think fast food is okay, because they are making money, yet, they do care about people’s health because they are adding healthier things on their menu, like salads, etc.

Obesity can be decreased throughout the United States. Maintain a good diet, get everyone in your family or even get a group together to start a diet, build up momentum to get yourself in the mood to start a new diet, use proportions, healthy foods. You will then realize how your grocery bill can slowly decrease and you actually like how you are changing your lifestyle. Also, you could start jogging or working out, get up in the morning and go work out! Build momentum to do that as well, if you do both you get a 2 in 1 shot of losing weight & becoming healthy.

Obesity is a real big problem in the United States and we could really change the world and make it a better healthy environment, not just for ourselves but for everyone! Change the way you eat, change the way you do things that you think is productive for yourself. Obesity can really change your body, not for the good, but for the bad.

Sincerely,

Madison Pearson