According to recent data reported by the World Health Organization (WHO), in the last 40 years, the number of obese school-aged children and adolescents world-wide has skyrocketed: from 11 to 124 million—a tenfold increase! Meanwhile, the number of overweight children has reached 216 million.
On the Italian peninsula, 42% of young boys and 38% of young girls are overweight, and 21% of the boys and 14% of the girls are obese. These figures are surprisingly very similar to those in the US, where 35% of children are overweight and 26% are obese (numbers that at times decrease to as much as 18%, but most likely because very severe cases of obesity are not reported, according to the CDC or Center for Disease Control and Prevention).
The US witnessed a significant increase in overweight children and adolescents between 2 and 18 years old, between 1999 and 2018. The trend seems to be escalating more rapidly every year, especially among the youngest, namely boys 2-5 years old, a group that hit a peak in severe obesity, between 2015-2016. In the same period, overweight adolescent girls rose from 36% to 48% in just two years.
Overweight youth represents a health emergency that must be addressed immediately. Yet, as asserted by Professor Valter Longo, “a new nutritional strategy must be deployed”. Indeed, Professor Longo recently unveiled an innovative nutritional program that involves experts and families alike, with the goal of raising healthy children and adolescents who have the opportunity to live until 110 years old.
For more information see: “La longevità inizia da bambini” (Longevity Begins in Childhood, trans.)
by Professor Valter Longo.
