Aug. 12, 2004
Researchers at the University of Baltimore recently released a national obesity report card indicating that almost half of U.S. states have failed to pass obesity-prevention legislation and that more than one-third of U.S. states have failed to pass legislation addressing childhood obesity, WebMD Medical News reports. In the nation's first report card focusing on state obesity-prevention efforts, researchers assigned states a letter grade for their efforts to pass eight different types of legislation, including setting school nutrition standards, restricting school vending machine access and food offerings, measuring body mass index (BMI) in schools, and establishing obesity commissions. None of the states received an A for their efforts, and only Arkansas received a B; meanwhile, 10 states received a C, and 16 and 23 states received either a D or an F. In a separate analysis focusing solely on childhood obesity measures, the researchers failed to assign any states an A for their efforts. Arkansas and Connecticut were the only states that received a B, while nine states received a C, 21 received a D, and 18 received an F. The researchers say their "surprising" report indicates that despite the buzz about the nation's obesity epidemic, the majority of U.S. states are failing to "effectively" address the issue (Warner, WebMD Medical News, 8/11/04; Cotten et al., University of Baltimore Obesity Report Card, accessed online 8/12/04).