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Too Much TV Can Make Your Child Obese!
Do you have young children at home? How long do you let these little ones watch TV?
Let me give you some facts about children and the boobtube:
• A surprising 90 percent of American children under age 2 and almost 40 percent of babies under 3 months old watch TV REGULARLY.
• Each week, the typical American child gets almost 38 hours (or a full work week) of commercial media
• More than half of American children have a television in their bedroom
Studies reveal strong links between having a TV in the bedroom and numerous health and educational concerns, including:
• Lower scores on school tests
• Sleeping problems
• Eyesight damage
• Hormone disturbances
• Early puberty
• Decreased attention span
• Increased risk of smoking, and
• Obesity
Let’s look at the problem of childhood obesity.
In the past 25 years, the childhood obesity rate has more than doubled. Now, about 30 percent of children in the U.S. are overweight, with the incidence of childhood diabetes also increasing 10-fold in the last 20 years.
According to a new study published last month in The Journal of Law and Economics, banning fast food advertisements in the United States could reduce the number of overweight children, and eliminating the tax deductibility of TV advertising would also reduce the incidence of childhood obesity.
Shin-Yi Chou, Inas Rashad and Michael Grossman, the authors, found that a ban on fast food advertisements on TV during children’s programming would reduce the number of overweight children ages 3-11 by as much as 18 percent, and would lower the number of overweight adolescents ages 12-18 by 14 percent.
Research shows that there is an 80 percent chance that an overweight adolescent will grow up as an obese adult. Over 300,000 deaths have been attributed to obesity and weight problems in the U.S. annually.
Another study, published in the Archives of Pediatric & Adolescent Medicine, found that a child with a TV in the bedroom will increase his/her viewing time by nine hours per week!
Of course, the additional time spent watching TV or playing videogames will lessen the time the child spends doing outdoor activities and pursuing more active forms of recreation, leading to detrimental effects on his/her weight and overall health.
The researchers placed monitoring devices on the TVs to reduce the children’s viewing time by half (by not allowing the TV to turn on once the quota was reached) and discovered that:
• Their relative body mass index dropped and,
• They ate less snacks (consuming more than 100 calories less per day)
Now that you are aware of this threat to your child’s health, what can you do about it?
Take Back the Remote Control and Take Control of Your Child’s Health!
European Union members Sweden, Norway and Finland are the only countries to have banned commercial sponsorship of children’s programs so far. There are no indications that the U.S. will follow suit, not when hundreds of millions of dollars in advertising money are at stake.
While the statistics are quite alarming, the good news is that your child’s health is in your hands!
You are the parent and your kids will follow your lead. This is why it is absolutely crucial for you to introduce them to a healthy lifestyle.
You can start by following these simple but effective tips that will immediately have an impact on your children’s minds and bodies:
• Limit or eliminate TV time – Easier said than done but decreasing your children’s viewing time will not only keep them away from all those fast food and junk food commercials; it will also encourage them to increase their activity level and take on more intellectual pursuits.
• Prepare healthy meals and set family mealtimes – Keeping them away from fast food and junk food advertisements will mean nothing if you don’t prepare healthy meals for the family. Studies show that families who eat together have better overall nutrition. Let your children help in meal preparation as this makes them more likely to eat the healthy foods you’re serving.
• Increase exercise! Exercise as a family. Take walks, play games in the backyard, or introduce your children into sports. Set aside time each day for you to sweat it out with your kids.
• Stop drinking soda! Just remember this – each can or bottle of soda you consume increases your obesity risk by 60 percent! It’s easy to cut down your children’s sugar intake. Give them water and limit the amount of soft drinks and juice they drink.
• Teach your child healthy shopping habits – The unhealthiest foods in the supermarket are usually found in the aisles, so stay clear from those areas and grab most of your groceries around the perimeter, until such a time when you’re ready to switch to organic food.
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Tags: advertisements, childhood obesity, obesity, TV
