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150 schools receive height and
weight equipment to track child obesity
The SD Department of Health is giving 198
balance beam scales and wall-mounted measuring boards to 150 South Dakota
schools to help track the state’s growing child obesity problem. The
recipients include public, parochial and BIA schools.
In exchange for receiving the
equipment, schools will be asked to submit student height and weight data for
three years. The equipment was purchased with $40,000 in federal maternal and
child health and coordinated school health funding.
“Many of our schools are already
participating in the state’s school height and weight data collection effort,”
said Secretary of Health Doneen
Hollingsworth. “This equipment will help 150 schools better measure the height
and weight of their students and improve the quality of the data.”
Hollingsworth said the 2001-2002
data collection found 32.5 percent of
South Dakota students were already overweight or at risk of becoming
overweight. Overweight is defined as above the 95th percentile for children of
the same age and gender; at risk for overweight is between the 85th and 94th
percentiles. A complete copy of the 2001-2002 report is available on the web
at
www.state.sd.us/doh/Stats.
A recent report by WestEd shows a strong
connection between students’ academic achievement and their overall health and
well-being. The report, available at
www.wested.org, concludes that policies and practices that address the
health and developmental needs of youth are critical components of any
comprehensive strategy for improving academic performance.
Research shows that 60 percent of
overweight 5- to 10-year-old children already have at least one risk factor
for heart disease, including elevated blood pressure or insulin levels.
Overweight children are more likely to have liver disorders, hypertension,
sleep apnea and orthopedic complications. In addition, being overweight during
childhood increases the chance that an individual will be overweight as an
adult. |
