Study Shows Obesity Begins Earlier In Childhood

Written by Adam Bermudez


Video c/o The Associated Press.

In a study released yesterday by the New England Journal of Medicine available here, Emory University researchers found that incident obesity between the ages of 5 and 14 years was more likely to have occurred at younger ages, primarily among children who had entered kindergarten overweight.

According to the NEJM,

“Overweight 5-year-olds were four times as likely as normal-weight children to become obese (9-year cumulative incidence, 31.8% vs. 7.9%), with rates of 91.5 versus 17.2 per 1000 person-years. Among children who became obese between the ages of 5 and 14 years, nearly half had been overweight and 75% had been above the 70th percentile for body-mass index at baseline.”

obesity
Photo c/o nejm.org (New England Journal of Medicine)

The study was funded by the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development.

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