By Dan Janison, STAFF WRITER
On the Bloomberg administration's public-health enemies list, cigarette smoke is
getting company.
The city hospital system is quietly crafting a new program targeting obesity in
children, Newsday has learned.
"We will be launching a new initiative some time in the summer," said Marie
Russo, a spokeswoman for the Health and Hospitals Corp.
Nutrition for children has attracted attention because of recent studies showing
a nationwide increase in pediatric obesity, with 15 percent of Americans under
age 19 - or 9 million youth - overweight or obese.
Dr. Benjamin Chu, who just completed his first year as the corporation's
president, has repeatedly expressed concern about the trend, which many experts
say is leading to more cases of childhood diabetes and heart disease.
For now, details of the HHC's childhood obesity initiative, including projected
costs, remain under wraps.
Once unveiled, the push is expected to involve the HHC's network of child-health
clinics, which provide primary and preventive care to children and teens.
The latest crusade against fat marks one plank in government-sponsored
prevention programs aimed at improving public health.
Last summer - before the city's smoke-free indoor-air law drive - Chu launched a
program to beef up cardiac-care in the public system.
It has included hiring more specialists and implementing education programs -
including obesity - playing off the reported success of special asthma vans in
lower-income and minority communities.
"Dr. Chu's been trying to do a lot more community outreach on the the threat of
cardiac illness," said Council Health Committee Chairwoman Christine Quinn
(D-Manhattan). "They've been focused on getting more people involved, through
health fairs, community-based organization - traditional grass-roots outreach."
Quinn hailed Chu's expansion of cardiac services, "especially in this fiscal
environment."
But pushing an anti-obesity campaign can have its paradoxes as the
deficit-strapped city looks to cut costs and increase revenues.
One official concedes it's a bit off-message that three city hospitals -
Elmhurst Hospital Center in Queens, Harlem Hospital Center in Manhattan and
Jacobi Medical Center in the Bronx - house McDonald's outlets under 1990s
franchise deals. Although the restaurants agreed to offer salads, their menus
still offer the high-fat favorites.
Taken together, however, these concessions pay about $281,000 every year that is
earmarked for auxiliary patient care, HHC's Russo said.
Also to boost income, some public schools have candy and soda vending-machines.
State law says they cannot be used before lunch hour, but critics say the rule
is rarely enforced.
In the City Council, Quinn and David Yassky (D-Brooklyn) are sponsoring
legislation to ban candy and soda sales in schools during school hours.
Under their proposal, sugar-laden products would have to be replaced with more
nutritious snacks. They'd also ban machine sales of candy and of 20-oz. soda
containers.
For all the recent attention to new tobacco restrictions, even the
administration's anti-smoking effort has faced funding quandaries.
While the city prepares to ban smoking in most city workplaces by March -
including bars, restaurants and jails - future funding for some
smoking-cessation programs may hang in the balance.
Last year, previously-planned city budget allocations totaling $13 million for
programs to help smokers quit were cut from the state Health Department and HHC.
Officials say they are arranging to draw at least some of those funds from other
sources. Health advocates say the HHC smoking-cessation programs are still being
provided, but that staff has been trimmed. One of them, Judy Wessler of the
Commission on the Public's Health System, cautions against making the city
smoking agenda strictly punitive.
Adult obesity has gained attention as a serious problem recently. In the spring,
the American Cancer Society plans to kick off a "Great American Weigh-In" in
conjunction with Weight Watchers.
Locally, Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz has been running his own
promotional campaign - complete with public weigh-ins - to urge citizens to eat
sensibly and exercise more.
Source: Newsday Dot Com.
January 2003 News Article Index
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