What the CDC & Surgeon General Say About Overweight, Obesity and Kids

“Enhancing efforts to promote participation in physical activity and sports among young people is a critical national priority."

America loves to think of itself as a youthful nation focused on fitness. But behind the vivid media images of robust runners, Olympic Dream Teams, and rugged mountain bikers is the troubling reality of a generation of young people that is, in large measure, inactive, unfit, and increasingly overweight.

The consequences of the sedentary lifestyles lived by so many of our young people are grave. In the long run, physical inactivity threatens to reverse the decades-long progress we have made in reducing death and suffering from cardiovascular diseases. A physically inactive population is at increased risk for many chronic diseases, including heart disease, stroke, colon cancer, diabetes, and osteoporosis. In addition to the toll taken by human suffering, surges in the prevalence of these diseases could lead to crippling increases in our national health care expenditures.

The landmark 1996 Surgeon General’s report, Physical Activity and Health,6 identified substantial health benefits of regular participation in physical activity

Regular participation in physical activity during childhood and adolescence:

Helps build and maintain healthy bones, muscles, and joints.
Helps control weight, build lean muscle, and reduce fat.
Prevents or delays the development of high blood pressure and helps reduce blood pressure in some adolescents with hypertension.
Reduces feelings of depression and anxiety.
Through its effects on mental health, physical activity may help increase students’ capacity for learning.

The Surgeon General made the following recommendations for young people: All adolescents should be physically active daily, or nearly every day, as part of play, games, sports, work, transportation, recreation, physical education, or planned exercise, in the context of family, school, and community activities. Adolescents should engage in three or more sessions per week of activities that last 20 minutes or more at a time and that require moderate to vigorous levels of exertion.