As thousands of brainiac kids from around the globe began descending on the University of Tennessee for a week of Destination ImagiNation’s creative problem-solving summer camp, researchers in health and nutrition on the Knoxville campus couldn’t help noticing that scarcely any overly plump children were in that bunch of campers.
On average, they were less sedentary than their peers elsewhere. “And leaner than the kinds of kids you see going to Wal-Mart, especially in Tennessee, where the obesity rate is extremely high,” says Dr. Naima Moustaid-Moussa, co-director of UT’s multidisciplinary Obesity Research Center, one of several campuses with obesity projects associated with and partially financed by the National Institutes of Health.
As UT launches an afterschool program modeled after Destination ImagiNation in 17 Tennessee counties, UT researchers are banking on the notion that kids who are engaged in thought, ideas and creativity also will become more mindful of nutrition as a fundamental aspect of their daily well-being. The youths will be assigned tasks similar to those undertaken during Destination ImagiNation, which, for example, had youths constructing houses—using only newspapers and tape—large enough to fit a person inside.
“We want them to look at resources they have to solve complex problems,” says Dr. Betty Greer, a human ecology professor who helps oversee the summer camp and the pilot anti-obesity project targeting Tennessee’s youth. “We’re hoping this will make young people more tuned in to eating healthy. When people are more active, their metabolism works better and that hormone that controls hunger is better regulated.”
With Americans fatter and more malnourished than ever—almost two-thirds of the population is considered overweight or obese compared with 56 percent in the late 1980s and early ’90s, and people of color and the poor are the most obese of all—federal and university researchers and outreach workers from various anti-obesity organizations aim to make the public more mindful about its food consumption and economic toll of being too big. Some 300,000 deaths per year can be attributed to obesity, and medical costs associated with obesity are estimated at $147 billion annually.
First Lady Michelle Obama has been shining a spotlight on childhood obesity and the risks of obese children becoming obese adults, and the health care reform law contains several provisions to fight obesity. For its part, UT is halfway through a four-year study of childhood obesity and last month began working with youth in 17 Tennessee counties. Tennessee leapt from fourth place in 2009 to second place this year in a Trust for America’s Health-Robert Wood Johnson Foundation ranking of states with the fattest people.
Researchers are also busy investigating the numerous nuances associated with obesity—a chronic disease shaded by class, race, food cultures, nutritional mindsets and household income.
