Did you know that because obesity rates have tripled in the past 30 years, American children may have a shorter lifespan than their parents for the first time in our history? But a new government campaign may help to change that. Today, First Lady  Michelle Obama launched Let’s Move! – a program with a goal to end the childhood obesity epidemic within a generation.

The campaign includes getting more healthful foods in schools, bringing grocery stores to communities that don’t have them, and getting children to be more active. Some of the plans, like tax incentives for businesses, will need approval in Congress.

Let’s Move! already has many groups on board – like pediatricians, children’s TV networks, and school lunch suppliers – to help spread the message about how children can eat healthier and move more.

More specific details of the campaign are expected this spring.

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Sometimes, it’s the simple things that can make all the difference. And when it comes to childhood obesity, a new report finds having family dinners, getting enough sleep, and limiting TV time during the week can cut the risk. Researchers found four-year-olds that did these three things had a nearly 40 percent lower rate of obesity than children who didn’t do any of them.

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First lady, Michelle Obama, will be the leading lady in a new government campaign to fight obesity. The program includes recommendations from the Surgeon General on how to reverse the epidemic - from simply eating more fruits and vegetables to adding “high-quality physical education” in schools and bringing more supermarkets to low-income communities. Obama , who will take on childhood obesity, says everyone has to be willing to do their part to end the public health crisis.

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With more emphasis on stopping childhood obesity, some day cares are making changes in their menus. This article shows how a day care center in Delaware is serving grilled chicken instead of hot dogs, strawberries instead of cookies, and water and low-fat milk instead of fruit juice. The goal is to teach kids early that being active and eating healthy can be the norm and that junk food should be a rare treat.

Do you think changes like these will help reduce childhood obesity?

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Childhood obesity was front and center on Day 2 of the CDC’s conference on obesity prevention and control, The Weight of the Nation. HHS Secretary, Kathleen Sebelius, spoke at today’s meeting and said a national focus on childhood obesity is overdue.

“If there was an epidemic of little kids getting cancer, it would be a national crisis,” she said. “But because it’s obesity and the damage doesn’t come until later in life, we’ve been slow to act.”

To help reverse the obesity trend for children and adults, Sebelius says the government wants to help people eat healthy food by serving it in places like public schools, child care centers, recreation centers, senior centers, and other government buildings.

“This isn’t rocket science,” Sebelius explained. “People want to eat healthy diets, but they tend to eat whatever’s convenient and affordable.  If we want to reduce obesity, we need to make eating fruits and vegetables convenient and affordable for all Americans.”

There’s much more of what Sebelius had to say here.

What do you think? Do we need the government to help reverse the obesity epidemic, or should the government stay out of it?

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The USDA will have the power to regulate all food sold in schools – including vending machine snacks – when Congress renews programs for child nutrition. Senate Agriculture Committee chairman, Tom Harkin says this will ensure nutrition programs are not “undermined” by junk food in vending machines. Earlier this year, Harkin co-sponsored a bill that focuses on setting nutritional standards for food in school vending machines and stores to help fight childhood obesity rates.

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Last week, we showed you the latest about childhood obesity rates (they’re way up) and shared with you how experts say you should talk to your kids about diet, exercise, and their weight. Now, there’s another tool that can help your kids grow up healthy (and a super cute giveaway!!).

Gerber’s Start Healthy, Stay Healthy campaign wants to help you get your kids to eat better from birth to preschool. It features nutritional information based on the latest research, including great tips and tools to get you started.

And there’s a cool part where you can create a pledge to your kids. Tell them what’s in your heart, share a photo, even add music if you want.

Create your Start Healthy, Stay Healthy pledge here… then come back and share it with us in the comments. That’s all it takes to enter the drawing to win a diaper bag filled with a recipe tin and teddy bear, compliments of Gerber!

The Recipe Tin comes with these seven recipes: Peach Bars, Corn Bread, Apricot Marinade, Carrot Applesauce Cake, Peach Sorbet, Sippy Cup Smoothie, and Toddler Pot Pie. Plus there are additional recipe cards so you can add your own.

A few contest details – it runs through midnight EST this Friday, February 27, you have to have a U.S. mailing address to enter… and a random number generator will pick the winners.

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I don’t see this happening anytime soon, but… A new study finds banning fast-food advertising on TV in the U.S. could reduce the number of overweight children by as much as 18 percent. But the report’s authors at the National Bureau of Economic Research question whether it would be practical to make this happen – so far, only Sweden, Norway and Finland have done this. To give you an idea of just how many unhealthy ads kids see, check out this report on advertisements for unhealthy foods during children’s programming.

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Question: How do you get 10,000 kindergartners to find out how fun exercise can be? Answer: Give each one of them a free jump rope, of course! That’s one way the non-profit Seattle group, Treeswing is fighting childhood obesity. With its new Jump Up! program, the goal is to get those 10,000 jump ropes into the hands of every kindergartner in the city this fall.

Treeswing is all about reversing childhood obesity and bringing back the healthy habits of yesteryear. The name refers to “‘the good old days’ when children soared on the tree swing in the backyard or biked to a neighbor’s to play.” Executive director, Tracy Bennett tells FatFighterTV how we can have those good old days once again and how Treeswing is Making a Healthy Difference.

Man-Made Mess
“We created this situation. We have created an environment for this generation of children that is heavily focused on fast food, on video games, and screen time. Kids don’t ride their bikes to school any longer. Families don’t sit down to dinner together any longer. The result is a generation of kids that are increasingly overweight. It’s up to us – those of us who have gotten us to this point over the last 25-30 years – to do something about it.”

Sad Stats
“This generation of kids will be the first to have a shorter life expectancy than their parents. That hit me like a ton of bricks.”

Fight Obesity Like We Tackled Tobacco
“For quite awhile, the effort where tobacco was concerned was focused on the individual -˜Well, you just need to quit smoking.’ And it wasn’t until the other 75% of the population said, ‘Wait a minute. We’re going to make it harder for you. We’re going to restrict advertising on television, and we’re going to come down on the sale of cigarettes to minors, and we’re not going to let you smoke in public areas.’ That was when you began to see things happen.

And I think that’s very similar here. We can no longer look at people or children who are overweight and say, ‘Gee, they should do something about it.’ We need to change the environment in which they’re making choices.”

It Can Be Done
“We’re beginning to see those dents – whether it’s getting soda machines out of schools or nutritional labeling in restaurants. But we’ve got a long way to go, no question about it.”

Why Jump Ropes?
“To impress upon kids at a very early age – five and six years old – as they enter school and they enter kindergarten, that it’s very important to be physically active every day in some fashion. Jump roping, in particular for that age, is a very easy thing to do – you can do it inside, outside, with a friend, by yourself, sing songs with it, you don’t need special equipment, you don’t have to travel somewhere.”

Getting Through To Parents
“Enclosed with the jump ropes is an education piece aimed at parents that tells them more about the benefits of regular physical activity, and also about the chronic diseases associated with obesity.”

Jump Up! – A Springboard
“I hope at the very least it will make a dent with parents because that is the key to this issue – kids watch their parents and to the extent that parents can model physical activity, that parents can make healthier choices available to their kids – whether that’s on the dinner table or how they spend Saturday afternoon or what they do when they come home from school – that’s where you’re really going to be able to make an impact.”

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Treeswing and its partners will launch the Jump Up! school campaign September 30. The program includes a calendar for kids to track their jumping and prizes to keep them motivated to use their jump ropes. Go here for more information on Treeswing and Jump Up!

Thanks, Treeswing for Making a Healthy Difference.

Check out all of FFTV’s Making a Healthy Difference honorees here.

If you know of someone you think we should profile, we want to hear from you. Just send us an email at sahar [at] fatfightertv [dot]com

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It’s how New York will track obesity levels in some schools – as students start the school year, some of them will have to weigh in first. A new law requires public schools outside of New York City to get students’ weights and body mass indexes as part of an effort to fight childhood obesity.

The information will help health officials to evaluate obesity levels based on where the kids live. The data will be confidential and gathered as students start second, fourth, seventh and 10th grades.

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