Scientists: U.S. failing to help obese kids

WASHINGTON — One-fifth of children are likely to be obese by 2010, yet the government killed a promising program that portrayed exercise as cool.

Other efforts to turn the tide of childhood obesity are scattershot and don't have enough money, the Institute of Medicine said Wednesday.

The institute did find some encouraging signs that the threat to children's health is being taken seriously. Programs that target youngsters' growing waistlines are sprouting nationwide, it said.

But no one knows which programs really help kids slim down, the institute said in calling for research to identify the best methods.

An expert panel convened by the group also lamented a lack of national leadership needed to speed change.

"Is this as important as stockpiling antibiotics or buying vaccines? I think it is," said Dr. Jeffrey Koplan of Emory University, who led the IOM's panel. "This is a major health problem. It's of a different nature than acute infectious threats, but it needs to be taken just as seriously."

To reinforce that point, Wednesday's report spotlighted the government's VERB campaign, a program once touted as spurring a 30 percent increase in exercise among the preteens it reached. It ended this year because of Bush administration budget cuts.

VERB encouraged 9- to 13-year-olds to take part in physical activities such as bike riding or skateboarding. Slick ads, at a cost of $59 million last year, portrayed exercise as cool at an age when outdoor play typically winds down.

The program's demise "calls into question the commitment to obesity prevention within government," the panel concluded.

Koplan, a former CDC director, was more blunt, calling it a waste of taxpayer money to develop a program that works and then dismantle it.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is "trying to do everything we can to package the research and lessons learned from VERB so it can inform campaigns local groups might take on throughout the country," responded CDC spokesman Jeff McKenna.

The report cites other examples of promising federal programs that have yet to reach their potential. Kids gobbled fruits and vegetables in an Agriculture Department school-snack program, but it only reaches 14 states. And the CDC's main anti-obesity initiative had enough money this year to start childhood nutrition and exercise programs in just 28 states.

The report also lauded some creative state and local efforts, including:

• A California program, started in Marin County, to build new sidewalks and bike paths that is getting more children to walk or bike to school.

• A community-garden project in New York's Harlem neighborhood to increase inner-city youngsters' access to healthful food and safe recreation.

• An effort by Arkansas schools to notify parents when students are overweight. Combined with new school menus and physical-activity programs, the initiative recently reported a leveling off of the state's child-obesity rate.

Seventeen percent of U.S. youngsters already are obese, and millions more are overweight. Obesity can lead to diabetes, high blood pressure and cholesterol, sleep problems and other disorders.