Want Your Children to Have Healthy Weights? Yes to Physical Sports No to Video Games

Native News Network Staff in Native Health. Discussion »

WASHINGTON – A study conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention conducted in 40 states found that 39.5 percent of low-income American Indians and Alaska Native children ages 2 to 5 are overweight or obese. The study found the rate of overweight and obesity to be higher in American Indian and Alaska Native children than in any other racial or ethnic group.

Yes to Sports

If you want your children to have healthy weights, they should participate in physical sports. Simply relying on active video games will not make help them lose weight.

An active video game doesn't necessarily make a kid more active. A new study of 78 children, ages 9 to 12, shows that kids were no more or less active when playing an active video game.

“If Mama brings a video game home, can she expect that her child will get more physical activity, and the answer is, as far as we can tell, no,”

states Dr. Tom Baranowski, a professor of pediatrics at the Baylor College of Medicine and Texas Children's Hospital in Houston.

Experts say children should get 60 minutes of activity a day for good health.

“Parents who want to have their kids to be more physically active should enroll their children in school-based sports teams, other kinds of physical activities.”

The study in the journal Pediatrics was supported by the National Institutes of Health.

posted March 28, 2012 6:10 am edt