Obesity in Childhood

Abstract

 Childhood obesity is a serious medical condition that effects children and adolescent  Childhood obesity has more than doubled in children and tripled in adolescents in the past 30 yrs. 1-2  Nowadays more than one third of children and adolescents were overweight or obese 1  Children and adolescents are considered overweight or obese if the Body Mass Index exceeds the 85 or the 95 percentiles on curves or exceeds 30kg/m at any age 3  Overweight and obesity are the result of “caloric” imbalance”too few calories expended for the amount of calories consumed – and are affected by various genetic, behavioral, and environmental factors 4-5