Does the childhood obesity campaign in Georgia cross the line?
Those of you who have read my previous blog items on obesity know that this trend in our society worries me. There are two children’s hospitals in Atlanta that merged many years ago, and they recently started an organization called Strong4Life to combat childhood obesity.
I lived in Atlanta for many years and can attest, both anecdotally and by the numbers, that overall health is worse there than in Boston. According to Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta, the parent of the two hospitals, Georgia has the second highest rate of childhood obesity in the US with almost 1 million children and teenagers considered obese. News reports quote various representatives talking about how they are treating kids with conditions unheard of 10-20 years ago, such as joint replacement needs and hypertension, due to obesity. They’ve tried education and decided to try something more “blunt” after their own studies found that 75% of parents with obese children did not think they had a problem. The new approach lead to billboards and posters like this:
They are also running commercials, interviewing obese kids and teenagers in Georgia, as Public Service Ads (PSA) – you can see the videos on their website. They remind me of some of the campaigns against smoking and teenage drug use, but the interesting thing is there has also been a backlash against the campaign . Some people are saying that it further stigmatizes kids.
Without getting into too much detail, there is almost unanimous agreement that childhood obesity is a significant public health issue in the US due to the lifelong issues it can lead to. One leg of WGA’s Engage in Health efforts are focused on the issue of childhood obesity in our community because we think it’s so critically important.
I frequently talk to clients about how to engage their employees, and their employees’ spouses, in getting healthier, and I stress the importance of communication. I also talk about how, at some point, employers may need to use penalty type approaches to force those that refuse to participate to engage in the program.
Everyone has a different idea of where the lines that should not be crossed exist. After trying other means to incent, educate and encourage change, do you need to use “the stick” to change behavior? And what does that stick look and act like? Is Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta and its Strong4Life organization going over your “line”? Would you go this far with your employees to get them to change?
I encourage your comments to let us know what you think.
About the Author
Scott Kirschner is a Vice President in the Employee Benefits practice at WGA. Mr. Kirschner has an extensive and diverse background that benefits clients in numerous ways. He has been a national leader on prescription drugs, health data management and stop-loss reinsurance, and has worked on broad Human Resource projects with large multi-national companies and understands the full range of challenges facing HR departments. Mr. Kirschner is a member of WGA’s Health Reform Advisory Team and the Engage in Health wellness team.
617.646.0377 SKirschner@wgains.com Connect with Scott on LinkedIn
