Thomas Mott Osborne: “In the world of athletics, each year our young people get bigger, they get stronger, and they get faster. Unfortunately…”

“In the world of athletics, each year our young people get bigger, they get stronger, and they get faster. Unfortunately, many of our young people just get bigger. They consume diets that are very high in fat. Sometimes a serving of fruit equals a serving of Fruit Loops and a serving of vegetables equates to French fries or potato chips. As has been mentioned previously, 60 percent of Americans currently are overweight, 20 percent are obese, and among our young people the percentages are just about the same. An alarming trend has been that we are starting to see atherosclerosis in elementary school children. These are fatty deposits in the coronary arteries which lead directly to heart disease. This was unheard of 20 or 30 years ago. Type 2 diabetes is exploding among our young people. And of course this again is related to being overweight. Many children do not exercise. They watch TV and play video games. Senate 870 authorizes the extension of a valuable school pilot program. The fruit and vegetable pilot program provides fresh fruit and fresh vegetables to a limited number of schools during the current school year.”