An Innovative Approach to Fighting Childhood Obesity

In his brilliant review of my book, Dr. Sun explains “This is why the book New Prescription for Childhood Obesity looks important, as it promises to provide a new and effective solution to the childhood weight problem. This gives a genuine hope for all the frustrated children and their parents”.

Childhood obesity is a common health issue around the major part of the world, including the developed countries like the United States and many newly emerging countries like China. There are over 155 million children who have suffered from this illness around the world. In the United States alone, there are over 9 million children with childhood obesity. This health issue seems to be more critical now than before, as more and more children have increasingly got overweight and the solutions to this problem have proven to be less effective.

 The major problem with childhood obesity is twofold: First, the ineffectiveness of the mainstream prescriptions to childhood obesity is due to conventional limited understandings of this illness. For instance, many people including medical professionals believe that the cause of obesity is “eating more and exercising less”. And then the treatment for obesity is simply “eating less and exercising more”. This approach does not work over the long term because it is unsustainable. Furthermore, the traditional approach does not address the fundamental cause of childhood obesity. The actual cause of obesity and its associated chronic diseases is rooted in damaging free radicals throughout the body, which trigger oxidative stress and low-grade silent inflammation. It is oxidative stress and the silent inflammation that produces inflammatory hormones and chemicals, which turn on genes causing fat storage and disease and in the meanwhile, turn off genes reducing inflammation and health risks. Therefore, any effective solution to childhood obesity must address the issue of damaging free radicals.

Second, parents lack the knowledge as well as workable strategies and skills directly related to the children’s obesity. Indeed, it is parents’ duties and responsibilities to care about their children’s overweight problem and the long-term solutions. Particularly, parents need to educate themselves before they can teach and help their children. To stress the point again, parents should be “a positive role model”. In many cases, children’s obesity comes from their parents, particularly their unhealthy life styles and eating habits. Therefore, the key solution to childhood obesity actually rests upon the minds and behaviours of parents. For instance, in their reproductive years, women need to plan ahead of pregnancy to ensure that their children will not be overweighed before they are born, thereby to reduce the possible risk for their children of developing obesity in their childhood and adulthood. Parents before you get pregnant make sure that you are in the best of health—both mentally and physically:

1.     Make sure your blood sugar is well controlled---both for diabetes and those with insulin resistance (1 in 3 American adult has this metabolic syndrome, and therefore you are likely to have the syndrome if you are overweight or obese) --- ask your doctor to check fasting blood sugar and hemoglobulin A1C.

2.     Reduce abdominal fat----source of inflammatory hormones and chemicals triggering free radicals. Increases chance of pregnancy if you have infertility problems like PCOS. Also secures a healthy pregnancy.

3.     Lose at least 20 to 30 pounds---- or attain a healthy BMI 18.5 – 24.9

4.     Limit or avoid alcohol, drugs, smoking, sodas, sweets, salty foods like fast foods and processed foods with additive triggering free radicals.

5.     Get your  blood pressure into normal healthy range (120-130/70-80)

6.     Reduce stress, and get adequate sleep and relaxation

7.     Get regular physical activity

8.      During your pregnancy don’t eat for two. Eat an anti-inflammatory diet rich in vegetables, fruits, beans, soy, whole grains, sea foods like salmon and tuna, and nuts like walnuts.  Ideally, you should not gain more than 20 pounds except you are under weight at the start of your pregnancy.  The fetus, uterus, blood volume, breast tissue, amniotic fluid, and placenta account for about 13-to-17 pounds of the normal weight gain in pregnancy.  Any weight beyond this is mostly undesirable maternal fat.

  Dr. Sun’s review continues, “It is based on the fundamental understandings of childhood obesity that Dr. Johnson provides a newer approach to fighting childhood obesity. This new solution rests on employing nature’s powerful super-antioxidants and phytonutrients to deactivate damaging free radicals. Rather than focusing on conventional “dieting” approach producing only short-term weight loss and fat reduction, in this book Dr. Johnson provides children with specific simple strategies, techniques, and skills for eating not only high quality foods, but the right amount of food appropriate for their level of physical activity without dieting or restrictions. The easy-to-follow long-term solutions teach children to maintain a healthy lifestyle that can automatically become a normal part of their daily routine. In so doing, children will have a better chance of reducing excess body fat and maintaining a healthy body that produces less oxidative stress and inflammation and leads to less craving and overeating. The benefits of this new approach can be more, such as increase in energy, growth of muscle tissue, and a faster metabolism that converts calories into cellular energy instead of toxic fat. 

“It is noticeable that unlike the traditional approach that prescribes universally applied treatments for all children, this book emphasizes tailored programs to meet the actual demands and requirements of individual children. Hence, specific factors like children’s personalities, eating habits, levels of physical activities, and food varieties and cooking styles must be incorporated into a therapy program and considered as a strategy for reducing obesity and inflammation.

“Dr. Johnson also informs us that Inflammation comes not just from foods and diets, but also from many other sources, such as the body conditions (bacteria, viruses, infections, the digestive systems, etc.), the natural environment (e.g., environmental pollutions), and the social environment (e.g., cultures, social conventions and life styles). Thus, an effective solution to childhood obesity should be a comprehensive and systematic solution, rather than purely relied on a single diet program or a physical activity program. This holistic way of thinking about childhood obesity is inspirational. Another remarkable characteristic of this book is that it provides valuable information and knowledge as well as workable strategies and skills directly to parents”.

 Concluding, Dr. Sun had this to say, “This book has 14 chapters with five appendices. The first six chapters contain the basic theories and knowledge on childhood obesity, in which the theoretical foundation for the new approach to fighting childhood obesity is laid down. However, the new theory on childhood obesity looks thin in here. More articulations and explorations may be needed to widen and deepen the understandings and to address the complexities of childhood obesity. The later eight chapters focus on food choices, diet styles and food supplements, which provide very detailed information and skills and techniques for parents to help their children to get enough antioxidants and phytonutrients to neutralize the high levels of free radicals produced from eating foods and from environmental pollutants. The appendices are also very useful, as they offer a daily meal plan and more than 40 recipes for obesity reduction.

“Overall, this is a very valuable book on childhood obesity. The understanding on obesity issues is distinctive and fairly fundamental, the new approach to fighting childhood obesity is innovative, and the strategies, methods and techniques used in the new remedy program are helpful. The presentation of this book is clear, fluent and easy to be understood by all readers even with little knowledge of medicine. To all the parents who care about their children’s weight, this book is an essential read”.

Dr. William Sun is author of “The Triple Process Remedy: A New Philosophy on Illnesses of Stress, Anxiety and Depression”, ISBN 978-0-9558373-0-2. He received Doctor of Philosophy in Law from Leeds Metropolitan University, England.  He is currently Senior Lecturer of Leeds Metropolitan University, England, Visiting Professor of Harbin Engineering University, China, and Director of The Process Centre, England.

Question: Do you believe that the traditional approach to childhood obesity, "eat less and exercise more"  promotes obesity in children rather than reduce it?