Comparing the Effects of Nutrition and Obesity on School Aged Children in the United States and the United Kingdom
Dietary nutritional values for public institutions have been increasingly monitored over the past few decades, with a desire to be healthier and better-rounded with respect to dietary needs. School aged children have a large influence on policies based around nutrition because of the developmental needs of a good diet. The United States and the United Kingdom show similarities and differences in the ways they attack the problem of poor menus in schools. Some differences may arise from the fact of the US being an ocean away with a population about five times greater than the UK. Both countries are in good health with respect to average mortality rates and average life expectancy, however the obesity rates in these nations is well above the global average with the UK being the sixth most obese nation with a rate of 25% and the US being most obese at 36% of adults being considered overweight or obese (Public Health, 2013). Public …show more content…
Nanney, Davey, and Kubik (2013) state that obesity rates are as much as 50% higher in rural youth in comparison to their urban counterparts. This same connection is true within the populations of the UK as shown by Belot (2011). This could be true for many reasons including difficult distribution of healthy meals to school programs or low availability of healthy foods for a home menu. In both the US and the UK, rural health seems subject to some sort of environmental or circumstantial stimulus that triggers a rising obesity rate when compared to urban populations.
One possible stimulus responsible for this gap in health distribution is nutrition in the school system. As has been shown, poor nutrition correlates to poor health. Surveys studying the
Comparing the Effects of Nutrition and Obesity on School Aged Children
Dietary nutritional values for public institutions have been increasingly monitored over the past few decades, with a desire to be healthier and better-rounded with respect to dietary needs. School aged children have a large influence on policies based around nutrition because of the developmental needs of a good diet. The United States and the United Kingdom show similarities and differences in the ways they attack the problem of poor menus in schools. Some differences may arise from the fact of the US being an ocean away with a population about five times greater than the UK. Both countries are in good health with respect to average mortality rates and average life expectancy, however the obesity rates in these nations is well above the global average with the UK being the sixth most obese nation with a rate of 25% and the US being most obese at 36% of adults being considered overweight or obese (Public Health, 2013). Public …show more content…
Nanney, Davey, and Kubik (2013) state that obesity rates are as much as 50% higher in rural youth in comparison to their urban counterparts. This same connection is true within the populations of the UK as shown by Belot (2011). This could be true for many reasons including difficult distribution of healthy meals to school programs or low availability of healthy foods for a home menu. In both the US and the UK, rural health seems subject to some sort of environmental or circumstantial stimulus that triggers a rising obesity rate when compared to urban populations.
One possible stimulus responsible for this gap in health distribution is nutrition in the school system. As has been shown, poor nutrition correlates to poor health. Surveys studying the
Comparing the Effects of Nutrition and Obesity on School Aged Children