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New Study Seeks to Lower Diabetes Risk in Youth |
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From EurekAlert! - Breaking News: As schools across the country reopen their doors this fall, hundreds of sixth graders in 42 middle schools will begin taking part in a study sponsored by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The HEALTHY study will determine if changes in school food services and physical education (PE) classes, along with activities that encourage healthy behaviors, lower risk factors for type 2 diabetes, an increasingly common disease in youth. In one such study, about half of eighth graders in 12 schools were overweight or at risk for overweight. Among youth 2 to 19 years old, 17 percent are overweight (i.e., have a BMI at the 95th percentile or more for their age and sex) -- triple the rate in 1980. This form of diabetes usually strikes children and young adults, who need several insulin injections a day or an insulin pump to survive. "As a society, we need to address the obesity epidemic if we're going to have any success containing the rising rate of type 2 diabetes in kids. Nearly 21 million people in the United States -- 7 percent of the population -- have diabetes, the most common cause of blindness, kidney failure, and amputations in adults and a major cause of heart disease and stroke. Sponsored by the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK), the study is part of a broad research initiative, called STOPP T2D (Studies to Treat or Prevent Pediatric Type 2 Diabetes), which seeks to improve the treatment and prevention of type 2 diabetes in youth.
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