<\/p>\n
New data showed childhood obesity has\u00a0hit a record\u00a0high\u00a0in recent years, while federal changes such as cuts to food\u00a0assistance\u00a0programs and a revamped food pyramid reignite debates over how to handle the issue.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) report late last month showed more than 1 in 5 U.S. children and teenagers were obese between 2021 to 2023, compared to only 5.2 percent between 1971-1974. The number\u00a0of children with\u00a0severe obesity\u00a0in recent years has hit 7 percent.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
School meals, physical\u00a0activity\u00a0and weight loss drugs have all become talking points in the problem, which is a major issue in the \u201cMake America Healthy Again\u201d movement associated with Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.<\/p>\n
Experts point to school\u00a0meals and increased activity as\u00a0key ways\u00a0to address\u00a0childhood obesity, with research showing school meals are the healthiest eating options some students have all day.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThey\u2019re noting that this increase in obesity occurred during\u00a0COVID-19\u00a0and that jump in childhood obesity happened during the years when millions of\u00a0kids\u00a0lost\u00a0access to reliable school meals.\u00a0So,\u00a0when schools closed for virtual learning, children lost a critical source of daily nutrition,\u201d said Erin Hysom, senior child nutrition policy analyst on the Child Nutrition Programs and Policy team\u00a0for the Food Research & Action Center.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI think that the data underscores\u00a0\u2026\u00a0the\u00a0important role\u00a0in healthy school meals for all, the\u00a0important role\u00a0in the National School Lunch Program and the School Breakfast Program in supporting children\u2019s health and\u00a0well being,\u201d Hysom added.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Only nine states currently offer free breakfast and lunch to all\u00a0public school\u00a0students, but others have been looking to expand their programs.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
The importance of school meals has been recognized by the Trump administration, with Kennedy\u00a0releasing an\u00a0upside food pyramid\u00a0earlier this year that could affect how food looks for students in the future.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cAs noted in the MAHA Strategy, more than 60 percent of children\u2019s daily calories come from highly processed foods, a pattern linked to higher rates of obesity,\u00a0diabetes\u00a0and other chronic conditions. Addressing childhood obesity is a priority for the Administration as part of its broader effort to improve the nation\u2019s health and reduce diet-related chronic disease. Expanding access to nutritious foods and promoting healthy lifestyles for children are central to that work,\u201d a spokesperson for HHS said in a statement to The Hill.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Dietary Guidelines issued under Secretary Kennedy emphasize whole, minimally processed foods. These Guidelines inform dozens of federal nutrition programs, including school meal programs,\u201d the spokesperson added.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The new food pyramid shows\u00a0vegetables, fruits, proteins,\u00a0dairy\u00a0and healthy fats at the top and whole grains at the bottom. While the pyramid caused some stir in the health community over its friendliness toward meat and fat, there was\u00a0agreement\u00a0over its\u00a0emphasis in eliminating\u00a0ultra-processed\u00a0foods.\u00a0<\/p>\n
But it could be years before the changes actually work their way down to school lunch lines.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u00a0know that school meals are one of the healthiest sources of meals, and\u00a0there\u2019s\u00a0been increased\u00a0attention about: Are\u00a0there ways to reduce some of the processed meals available in schools? And this, I think,\u00a0is can be\u00a0an incredible opportunity to help address some of the obesity as well, so long as\u00a0we\u2019re\u00a0making those investments in schools,\u201d said\u00a0Juliana Cohen,\u00a0professor\u00a0of health sciences and nutrition at\u00a0Merrimack College and principal investor at NOURISH Lab.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cBecause to be able to provide the healthier school meals, we really need to make sure that we have adequately trained and paid staff. They need to have access to the highest quality foods available, have the equipment and the infrastructure for more scratch cooking,\u201d she added.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Trump administration is also\u00a0approving requests\u00a0from 18 states to take junk food and sodas\u00a0off of\u00a0food\u00a0assistance\u00a0programs.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Kennedy, meanwhile,\u00a0announced this week\u00a0that multiple top medical schools\u00a0have agreed to\u00a0require that all their students go through\u00a040 hours of nutrition education, starting in the fall of\u00a02026.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
This will \u201creshape the way that we train doctors in our country and deliver on President Trump\u2019s promise and the chronic disease epidemic in America,\u201d Kennedy said Thursday, adding \u201cmore than 30,000 physicians each year will now graduate equipped with nutrition education to help prevent and reverse chronic disease. This is how we implement the MAHA agenda.\u201d<\/p>\n
Getting children enough exercise is another big part of the problem. Only 12 states currently have laws on the books requiring recess at schools, with no federal mandate on the books.<\/p>\n
\u201cOver the past several decades, many of those physical activity opportunities that a lot of us kind of take for granted that we had in schools, like recess and opportunities for physical education and just general movement throughout the day,\u00a0have been\u00a0taken away and replaced by a\u00a0focus on standardized tests,\u201d said Erin Hager, professor at the Department of Population, Family and Reproductive Health at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. \u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd\u00a0so\u00a0I think what we really need is an increase in opportunities for kids to be physically active during the day, including recess for kids, not just middle school,\u00a0maybe even\u00a0high school, and thinking ways that we can get kids moving during the school day,\u201d she added.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
And under the surface of the food and exercise discussions\u00a0is the medical debate on weight loss drugs for children, which has\u00a0accelerated\u00a0since the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved GLP-1s for use with Americans as young as 12.<\/p>\n
There are currently four medications approved to treat obesity for those ages 12 to 17: Wegovy, Saxenda, Orlistat and Qsymia. <\/p>\n
The CDC found in 2023, the year\u00a0new weight loss drugs for\u00a0adolescents\u00a0came on the market, there was a 300 percent spike in obesity medication prescriptions for\u00a012 to 17 year olds.\u00a0While that increase is high, it still only\u00a0represents\u00a00.5 percent of children in this age\u00a0group\u00a0with obesity receiving medications for it.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
A study that came out in 2024 showed Saxenda helped lower the body mass index in those ages 6 to 12, fueling debate to how young these drugs should be offered.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think that prevention\u00a0is a high priority, and there are things that pediatric primary care providers can give guidance to families, even in infancy and toddlerhood and early childhood, they can\u00a0establish\u00a0healthy habits that can help to prevent childhood obesity,\u201d said Matthew Haemer, chair of the\u00a0American Academy of Pediatrics Section on Obesity.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThinking about the tools that the health care system has available, there\u2019s individualized counseling by primary care providers that can be supplemented with behavioral interventions that have a strong evidence of being able to treat childhood obesity. And for those children \u2014 especially those children with the most severe obesity and those children that are already suffering from\u00a0health conditions related to their obesity \u2014 FDA-approved medications can be a helpful tool in the toolbox to help improve their health and quality of life,\u201d Haemer added.<\/p>\n
Copyright 2026 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.<\/i> <\/p>\n
For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to . <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
New data showed childhood obesity has\u00a0hit a record\u00a0high\u00a0in recent years, while federal changes such as cuts to food\u00a0assistance\u00a0programs and a revamped food pyramid reignite debates over how to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":441,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-440","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-education"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/parkmania.pl\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/440","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/parkmania.pl\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/parkmania.pl\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/parkmania.pl\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/parkmania.pl\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=440"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/parkmania.pl\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/440\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/parkmania.pl\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/441"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/parkmania.pl\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=440"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/parkmania.pl\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=440"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/parkmania.pl\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=440"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}