Obama's Plan to End Childhood Obesity Epidemic

 

 

The goal of the White House Task Force on Childhood Obesity led by First Lady Michelle Obama is to reduce childhood obesity from 20% to 5% by 2030.

To acheive this goal, the plan makes 70 recommendations for early childhood, parents and caregivers, school meals and nutrition education, access to healthy food, and for increasing physical activity.

The White House plan recommends the following for early childhood development:

• Educate and help women to conceive at a healthy weight and have a healthy weight gain during pregnancy.
• Encourage breastfeeding.
• Federal and state agencies should prioritize research into chemicals in the environment that may cause or worsen obesity.
• Educate and support parents in efforts to reduce kids' watching television, using computers, video games and other digital media.
• Improve federal early childhood programs' child nutrition and physical activity practices.

The White House plan recommends the following to empower parents and caregivers:

• The federal government should work with local communities to advocate 2010 Dietary Guidelines for Americans and the updated Food Guide Pyramid.
• The FDA and USDA should work with the food and beverage industry to develop standardized nutrition labels for packages.
• Restaurants and vending machines should display calorie counts of all items offered.
• The food and beverage industry should extend its voluntary self-regulation to restrict all forms of marketing to children. If this does not happen, federal regulation should be considered.
• Media and entertainment companies should limit licensing of popular characters to healthy food and beverage products.
• Insurance plans should cover services needed to help prevent, assess, and care for child obesity.

The White House plan recommends the following for healthier food in schools:

• Update federal standards for school meals and improve the nutritional quality of USDA foods provided to schools.
• Increase funding for school meals.
• Encourage schools to upgrade cafeteria equipment to support healthier foods.
• Connect school meal programs to local growers and encourage farm-to-school programs.
• Improve nutritional education in schools and make it more available.
• Increase the use of school gardens to educate about healthy eating.
• Promote healthy behaviors in juvenile correction facilities.

The White House plan recommends the following for improving access to healthy foods:

• Launch a multi-agency "Healthy Food Financing Initiative" to make healthy foods more available in underserved urban and rural communities.
• Encourage local governments to attract grocery stores to underserved neighborhoods.
• Encourage facilities that serve children (e.g., hospitals, recreation centers, and parks) to promote healthy foods and beverages.
• Provide economic incentives to increase production of healthy foods such as fruits, vegetables, and whole grains.
• Evaluate the effect of targeted subsidies on purchases of healthy foods through nutrition assistance programs.
• Study the effects of state and local sales taxes on calorie-dense foods.

The White House plan recommends the following for increasing kids' physical activity:

• School programs should stress physical activity as much as healthy nutrition.
• State and local school programs should increase the quality and frequency of age-appropriate physical education taught by certified PE teachers.
• Promote recess for elementary school students and activity breaks for older students.
• Federal, state, and local agencies should partner with communities and businesses to extend the school day in order to offer physical activity programs.
• The EPA should assist communities building new schools to place them on sites that encourage walking or biking to school.
• Increase the number of safe playgrounds and parks, particularly in low-income communities.
• Encourage entertainment and technology companies to continue developing new ways to engage kids in physical activity.