Children eat worse and worse (like parents) and exercise less and less (like parents), resulting in a rather worrying increase in overweight and obesity rates. And it does not worry about the image, although it is an important factor because they soon begin to form their self-esteem based on their image and how they fit into a society quite critical of everything, but because it has been seen that Children who are 8 years old are obese and show signs of heart disease, And this is very serious.
To reach this finding, Pennsylvania researchers performed 40 MRIs from 8 to 16 years old. Half were obese and the other half a normal weight. They saw that children with obesity had, on average, 27% more muscle mass in the left ventricle Y the heart muscle was 12% thicker in general. Although having more muscle mass in the heart sounds positive, because it seems to imply that it is a stronger heart, it really is not, since it is a sign of cardiac dysfunction.
Heart dysfunction?
So is. When a child is overweight, and especially when he is obese, blood pressure is increased and the heart needs to pump harder so that the blood reaches the tissues correctly. That constant effort makes your muscle mass increase in the long term, the arteries thicken and blood flow is difficult (thicker arteries means there is less space for blood to pass). This increases the risk of cardiovascular problems such as heart failure (The heart is not able to supply the body and the rhythm is altered, fatigue appears, fluids are retained, ...), a angina pectoris or a heart attack.
It is really difficult for this to happen in childhood, but researchers have hinted that the risk of premature death in adulthood.
Linyuan Jing, lead author of the study and in words to the US Department of Health. He said the following:
It is surprising and alarming to us that even the youngest obese children in our study who were 8 years old showed evidence of heart disease ... Ultimately, we hope that the effects we have seen on the hearts of these children are reversible. But it is possible that there could be permanent damage.
40% of children were already affected
The most terrible thing is that 40% of children with obesity are already affected. In the tests they saw that having the thickest heart muscle was already producing a reduced ability to pump blood. Their families were told as they had a high risk of heart failure and heart disease in adulthood.
More and more children with obesity
It is estimated that obesity in children 6 to 12 years in the US It has more than doubled in the last 3 decades, and has quadrupled in adolescent age. These data are alarming, as are those of Spain (we have the title of third country with childhood obesity) and any country in the first world, actually.
And it is not only alarming at the cardiovascular level, it is that obesity carries many other risks such as asthma, hypertension, diabetes, depression, etc.
Touch of attention to the entire population
So this study is a touch of attention to the entire population, so that we begin to do something for our children, if we do not want them to end up with serious health problems:
- Carry one healthier and more balanced diet, avoiding processed foods, high in sugars and saturated fats, juices and soft drinks, returning to the Mediterranean diet and water as the main drink.
- Do not urge them to finish what we have put on the plate. If they can't with everything there is probably we have put too much and the mistake is ours.
- Exercise, which does not need to be a sport, but rather have a more active life. Do you remember that when we were little we spent the day in the street running and playing? Well, something like that.
- For this, it is worth limiting the use of the screens. The maximum that a child should be before them is 2 hours a day. If it comes to that, it is already a lot, so make responsible use, so that they play more actively. A ball is a very cheap gift, and it gives for hours of fun and shared play.
Photos | iStock
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