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Rhiannon Worker
Abstract
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This paper proposes to solve the childhood obesity rate for Latino youth in low-income
communities that have limited access to adequate grocery stores and physical activity resources.
It aims to persuade the organization YMCA and Food City to place their resources to
communities in need, so they will be available, accessible, and affordable. This paper proclaims
that this act will help push the healthy lifestyle for Latino youth and families to live a healthier
lifestyle.
The Latino population is growing rapidly nationally and globally. They are among the
highest minority groups for school dropouts, teen pregnancy, and are the third leading racial
group for childhood obesity. Since they are one of the leading racial groups for childhood obesity
(22.4%) and are still rapidly growing, they are the target for a lot of public health professionals
and researchers. Having adequate food supply has been proven to have a distinct connection with
the overall health of a community. (Mowen, 2010). Research has shown that food deserts, which
are areas that lack adequate nutritious food have a correlation with higher chances of becoming
obese. A scenario may include a family who are aware of how important it is to eat a healthy diet
and have daily exercise, however, if the food resources and physical activity is hard to access,
then the more difficult it will be for them to live a healthy lifestyle. As a human, I would like to
see every human being live a long, happy, and healthful life because everyone deserves that,
regardless of who they are. However, sometimes that is not bound to happen due to an endless
list of genetics, poor dietary habits, lack of exercise, and so on. Many may panic and act like it is
impossible to reverse this epidemic or even ignore that this is not a huge issue.
What’s at stake is obesity does not only affect children on the weight of a scale. It can
also harm a child’s self esteem, almost every system in their body such as heart, lungs, muscle
and digestive tract. In addition, having obesity at a young age increases the risk for disabilities
and death. Childhood obesity is highly preventable, especially if food sources with adequate
fruits and vegetables are available and affordable. Plus, having physical activity like gyms can be
a way to promote fitness. Some communities, specifically those who have no access to gyms or
grocery stores will have a difficult time finding ways to live a healthy lifestyle. This concludes
me to reach out to food and gym marketing companies because these populated areas are in
desperate need of adequate food sources and gyms. I propose that grocery stores and physical
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activity companies should focus on making changes that will make them available, affordable,
After a semester of research of childhood obesity, I propose making grocery stores and
physical activity resources accessible, affordable, and available. To help this proposal become
more realistic, the focus for a grocery store will be Food City. As for the gym, it will be the
YMCA organization. These companies have been chosen because they are known to be targeted
toward Latinos. The addition of these two sources will increase the chances of healthy lifestyles
There are thousands of communities that have a high prevalence in obesity, especially
communities that are limited to healthy lifestyle resources. How are they to blame when it is not
their entire fault for being overweight? For instance, you may be told by a professor to write an
essay that is meant to persuade an audience. The problem with this task is it would be assigned
without a prompt or guideline. As a regular student, you may have a general idea of how to write
the essay, but since you were not given the resources needed to help guide you, it would be very
difficult to complete the task. This type of example applies to families who are told by many
doctors about being more aware of losing weight. How are families who are obese or overweight
suppose to live a healthy lifestyle if the resources like grocery stores and gyms are not there? It
really is not logical. I feel not many doctors and health physicians understand this concept in
these vulnerable low-income communities. It is very easy to tell a person to lose weight and send
them on their way. This may sound simple, but there is much more to telling an individual to lose
weight. It is also not realistic to have a person run on a treadmill for hours throughout the day
and force them to only eat salad throughout their day. As much as many people believe this is all
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a person should do, are not fully aware of how environment plays a role in the goal to lose
weight.
As a nutrition major, being able to solve this obesity epidemic would be a dream come
true. Being able to witness the world become healthier and more physically active would be
almost similar to achieving a 4.0 at the end of a college career, or even winning an NBA
championship. Of course, this is going to take a lot of effort, dedication, and even teamwork for
that to happen. It is long and heavy process, however, like many scholars have said “everything
takes time and dedication.” Applying the process of school, sports, or any goal a person may
For this case, it is childhood obesity. In order to make the goal of preventing and
reducing the risk of obesity, it has to be a team effort. For example, in any sport there will always
be a coach and team. They work together hand in hand in hopes to come out with the big W. In
the prevention for childhood obesity case, the coach will be the researchers and public health
professionals. The team will be the community and people themselves. They must work side by
childhood obesity. I chose to focus on childhood obesity because they are our future leaders. At
an early age, they are learning habits that will carry them onto the rest of their lives. “Obesity
rates among adults and children in the United States have steadily risen in the past few decades.
About 18.4 percent of 12-19-year-olds are overweight or obese and childhood obesity often
continues into adulthood..” (2015.) Research indicates children who are obese are more
susceptible to continuing the disease into their adulthood which is also why I chose to focus on
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children. Focusing on making grocery stores and physical activity resources such as parks and
There have been many attempts to solve childhood obesity. Past efforts include health
professionals going into schools and only directing change toward children, adding physical
activity equipment in schools but not nutrition information, only studying the evolution of food
production, providing salad bars in schools for underserved children. These are minimal
solutions that have been used to help prevent childhood obesity, however, there is an important
piece missing. To achieve a long lasting sustainable program, there must be an approach that
targets the child, family, community, and policy as a whole. There are numerous intervention
programs that have been successful or failed. The reason why they have failed because the
intervention program did not consider barriers of the poor quantity of food and physical activity
environment.
I chose to focus my solution on the environment because without the necessary resources
you can not have the best possible outcome. I understand the environment of a community is out
of the doctors control. This is why I have decided to reach out to supermarkets and gym
corporations. Another reason why I chose the environment is because since these communities
do not have resources to live a healthy lifestyle in the first place, how are they suppose to react
Food insecurity and the difficulty of eating a well-balanced diet and exercising is hard
for almost every American. But those who are food insecure and low-income face more
frequently lack full-service grocery stores and farmers’ markets where residents can buy a
variety of high-quality fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and low-fat dairy products (Beaulac et
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al., 2009; Larson et al., 2009; Bell et al., 2013).“ Since the low-income communities have hardly
any access to grocery stores, they are most likely going to be limited to a corner store like a gas
If the food sources are available, there will be another problem as to whether they will be
affordable. “When adequate grocery stores and available, healthy food may be more expensive
compared to refined grains, added sugars, and fats are inexpensive.” (Aggarwal et al., 2012;
Darmon & Drewnowski, 2015; DiSantis et al., 2013; Drewnowski, 2010.) Since these families
who are already low-income will have a hard time purchasing healthful foods. It makes sense to
stretch out your dollar and buy what will get you more quantity. They will often try to buy as
much food as possible that is inexpensive, cheap, and less nutrient dense. In quotation, “While
less expensive, energy-dense foods typically have lower nutritional quality, and because of
overconsumption of calories, have been linked to obesity.” (Kant & Graubard, 2005; Perez-
Regarding physical activity resources, there has been a correlation with food insecurity
and physical activity. There are fewer opportunities in these low-income areas to exercise or be
active. Numerous studies have revealed higher-income communities have more parks and gyms
to be active. In 2010, a study stated “Lower income neighborhoods have fewer physical activity
resources than higher income neighborhoods, including fewer parks, green spaces, and
recreational facilities, making it difficult to lead a physically active lifestyle.” (Mowen, 2010). It
is not surprising physical activity and food insecurity have a correlation, given that many
I would like to raise some major counterclaims that have been inspired by the skeptic in
me. I have been ignoring the complexities in the situation. I am trying to find a solution to
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increase the frequency of grocery stores and physical activity resources for low-income
communities, but have not really mentioned what barriers these companies need to go through in
order to place their company there. Yet, is it necessarily true that the factors and steps of placing
an organization in a specific area will solve childhood obesity? Is it always the case, as I have
been suggesting, that these companies are able to provide markets and physical activity resources
that are available, accessible, and affordable? Of course, many will probably disagree on the
grounds that these low-income communities that are prevalent in childhood obesity are not able
to purchase groceries or gym memberships because they are not making a sufficient income.
Some people would rather have non-nutritious food than nutritious food, even if it was
available to them. Our national food system is comprised of fast food, sugary drinks, energy
drinks, high amounts of fat and sodium. My view is that these areas that are low-income minority
communities may be abundant in grocery stores and physical activity resources, yet would not be
educated enough to know what it means to live a healthy lifestyle. Companies may overlook
wholeheartedly support a company's question, which may be “will adding these grocery stores
and physical activity resources be the answer to preventing childhood obesity?” The evidence
shows that in order to help make a healthy impact for children is to have obesity prevention
programs that will be framed around family, community, and policy. Adding the grocery stores
and physical activity resources only accounts for community and policy at once. So, to answer
that question, only adding grocery stores and physical activity resources will not fully prevent
childhood obesity. There has to be at least some type of program that will assist in educating the
According to the question of “Is it always the case, as I have been suggesting, that these
companies are able to provide markets and physical activity resources that are available,
accessible, and affordable?” I would point out that consumer focus helps marketers anticipate the
demands of consumers, and production focus helps them respond to changes in the market. This
result reveals that areas where consumers are in high demand for grocery places, companies will
make their move to place their organization there. In order to market food products, an
organization may need to know if products will satisfy needs than competitors do. This is off
balance because these low-income communities whom are lacking grocery stores in the first
place, will not have any organizations competing against one another. They will be making a
healthy move and may even earn more money. Another reason food companies can make an
impact on low-income communities is that they are able to market certain food products that will
suit the geographical and cultural setting. By doing this, it will attract more consumers and
eventually have a steadily increase in more jobs and a better economy for that certain
community.
To conclude, I strongly believe making food resources like Farmers Markets, Food
Cities, and YMCAs, will make a change for obesity for a family and child since the child is taken
cared of by their parents. In addition to the grocery stores and physical activity resources, there
must also be an intervention program to help make vulnerable communities acceptable toward a
healthy change. They will have the resources needed to help make the changes and the support
needed by experts in nutrition and physical activity. The solution to prevent and treat obesity is
bound to happen.
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References
Community-Based Diabetes Prevention Program for Obese Latino Youth. Sage Journals,
http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/2150131910377909
Cooking and Gardening Program Reduces Obesity and Metabolic Risk in Latino Youth.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4446151/
Diabetes Prevention Program for Obese Latino Adolescents. PubMed. Retrieved from
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3840126/
prevention interventions targeting Hispanic children: lessons learned from the previous
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-789X.2010.00809.x/epdf