Obese Children and Mortality Risk

Obese children may be more likely to die prematurely.
The New York Times (2/11, A22, Rabin) reports that a study published Feb. 11 in the New England Journal of Medicine "that tracked thousands of children through adulthood found the heaviest youngsters were more than twice as likely as the thinnest to die prematurely, before age 55, of illness or a self-inflicted injury." While "youngsters with...pre-diabetes were at almost double the risk of dying before 55, and those with high blood pressure were at some increased risk," it was obesity that was "most closely associated with an early death, researchers said."
These "data come from a National Institutes of Health study that began in 1965," USA Today (2/11, Hellmich) reports. After tracking "4,857 American Indian children in Arizona for an average of 24 years," investigators found that "children who were the heaviest -- the top fourth -- were more than twice as likely to die early from natural causes, such as alcoholic liver disease, cardiovascular disease, infections, cancer, and diabetes, as children whose weight put them in the lowest quarter of the population."
Bloomberg News (2/11, Ostrow) reports, "The number of overweight and obese children has tripled since 1980, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention." Approximately "17 percent of US children ages two to 19 years old are considered obese and almost 12 percent are considered the heaviest kids, according to a CDC study released in January." The current study's "findings detail the 'serious health consequences' that children might face as they get older, lead study author Paul Franks said."
WebMD (2/10, Doheny) reported, "Death rates from natural causes among children in the highest group of glucose intolerance (a risk factor for developing diabetes) were 73% higher than among the children in the lowest group of glucose intolerance, the researchers found." While "no substantial links were found between cholesterol levels and premature deaths," the study authors "did find that high blood pressure in childhood raised the risk of premature death from natural causes by about 1.5 times."
HeartWire (2/10, O'Riordan) reported that an accompanying editorial "notes that the causes of obesity and diabetes appear to be rooted in culture -- inactivity and large portion sizes of calorie-dense fast food -- and that fighting these diseases with 'clinical and adult-based approaches' is akin to 'pasting a small bandage on a gaping wound.'" HealthDay (2/10, Reinberg) and MedPage Today (2/10, Fiore) also covered the story.