Healthy Happy Kids: Tackling Childhood Obesity in Alabama's Largest City, One After-School Program at a Time

摘要

Mena Edwards is a finicky eater. Every school morning, the 4-year-old eats breakfast with her classmates at John Herbert Phillips Academy in downtown Birmingham, but often, she just picks at her food. Until recently, that is. Now Mena brings a cucumber or a bag of carrots to munch.Mena and about 40 Phillips Academy students, mostly African Americans ranging from pre-Kindergarten through 7th grade, recently participated in Healthy Happy Kids, an after-school exercise and nutrition program developed by the Minority Health & Health Disparities Research Center (MHRC) at the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB). This program was designed to fight childhood obesity trends in Alabama, which ranks number 2 in adult obesity (31.6%) and number 6 in obese and overweight children (36.1%) among US states. Alabama also tops national charts in deaths from stroke (number 1), heart disease (number 2), cancer (number 7), and diabetes (number 8), each with links to excess body weight.