The obesity epidemic in North America has reached new heights. There was a time when obesity only affected adults and rarely children and adolescents, however, that time is now over. In 2007, Statistics Canada found that twenty nine percent of adolescents had unhealthy weights. In recent years more and more children have been diagnosed with obesity related diseases and health issues. Examples of obesity related diseases and health issues include: type two diabetes, kidney failure, stroke, heart attack, and high cholesterol. According to the World Health Organization (WHO) worldwide obesity has nearly doubled since 1980.
What could be the cause of such a drastic shift? The answer is sugar. Sugar is the chief ingredient responsible for early childhood-related obesity diseases. The social causes linked to obesity is the marketing of sugar filled foods and beverages and the ignorance of parents. The scientific causes are the highly addictive nature of sugar and the differences between refined and natural sugars.
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The food and beverage industry spends nearly two billion dollars annually to market foods and beverages to children and adolescents in North America. These foods and beverages marketed to children contain high amounts of processed sugar. Marketers glamourize sugary foods and beverages by placing toys or prizes in the packaging, using product placements in children shows, or creating characters for their products. Children are exposed to sugar in the media on a daily basis. This causes children to beg for sugary foods and beverages when they go to the grocery store with their parents. Typically the parents give in and buy their children whatever food or beverage they request. To combat this the United Kingdom imposed a statutory ban on television advertising of foods high in fats, sugar, and salt during children’s