Special Topic
Lunch Lessons
With obesity threatening our children, creating healthy
school lunch programs is not optional—and not impossible.
Ann Cooper
Not a day goes by without the media addressing America’s obesity crisis, and lately the discussion has settled on our children. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has con- cluded that if U.S. children don’t get their weight
in check, their anticipated health problems will significantly
shorten their lives and make them the first generation in U.S.
history to die at younger ages than their parents. It’s pre-
dicted that one of every two black and Latino children born
in 2000 in the United States—and one of every three white
children—will contract diabetes in their lifetimes, most before
they graduate high school (CDC, 2011). By 2018, this may
mean that 30–35 percent of all school-age children are insulin
dependent. The health ramifications are overwhelming. Yet
most of these problems could be prevented—if we improve
our children’s nutrition.
