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Education Week: Increase of Childhood Obesity Slowing in Calif., Study Suggests
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Between 2003 and 2008, California students were still
gradually growing more obese, but the rate of increase had slowed from years prior, according to a new study based out of the University of California, Davis.
The study, published in the February issue of the American Heart Journal, examines state fitness-test results of 6.3 million students in 5th, 7th, and 9th grades.
In the six-year time frame, obesity among the youths being examined rose 2 percent total, according to the study. The study's authors say that previous national studies estimate the annual rate of increase for childhood obesity to be between 0.8 percent and 1.7 percent; California's rate of increase in those six years was only 0.33 percent.
Overall fitness also increased, according to their findings. Of the six fitness areas measured by the test—aerobic capacity, body composition, abdominal strength, trunk extensor strength, upper-body strength, and flexibility—results largely varied, but the percentage of students with healthy aerobic capacity significantly increased.
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