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Children's
Health by Peary
Perry | |
I
started the year off by telling you that I didn't intend to waste a lot of everyone's
time slamming the government. I will have to rescind that remark since there is
just too much to write about.
All of last week was spent in our nation's
capital, Washington D.C. I was where the action was happening…inside the Beltway.
Let
me just say that I truthfully believe those people live in a different world than
we do. I don't mean to imply that they aren't real Americans. I just think they
live on a different plain than we do. Their concepts about situations which we
see everyday are looked at from a overall, nationalistic point of view as opposed
to our more regional viewpoint.
For example I had a meeting with the
National Institutes of Health about a medical concept I have been working on to
help identify children that are at risk for a heart attack or a stroke. The people
I met with could not have been nicer to me. They didn't laugh at anything I discussed
and were very encouraging while giving me some points to think about which had
not occurred to me beforehand. They were sincere people and very concerned over
the status of health in this country as it relates to children.
After
I described my concept, they asked me how I intended to get parents of overweight
children (those most at risk for strokes and heart attacks) to allow their children
to be tested.
I had assumed (wrong) that all parents would welcome any
test or noninvasive test which could help improve any child's life. They told
me otherwise. The parents who would sign up for any test would be the ones who
were concerned over their children, but how do you reach the parents who are feeding
their kids two pizzas a day and have no concept of the health of their child?
That's the real question. Those are the parents we need to reach out to and get
inside their heads to see what is going on and what can be done to help.
We are living in an age where the school cannot hand out an aspirin to anyone
under eighteen years of age, yet in many states young women are free to have abortions
without parental notification. That doesn't make a lot of sense to me. I won't
get into my views on this subject, but truthfully folks; to be fair don't we have
an obligation to teach both sides of any story, not just one? Shouldn't we be
teaching our children about nutrition and exercise and not to smoke at the same
time we teach geometry? I find this situation very disheartening.
The
health of the children of any nation is the key to the survival of that nation.
If we (parents, teachers, school districts, government, community) cannot evaluate
what is lacking in our children and try to prevent them from future deadly diseases
and infirmities, then who should?
I realize, as most of you do, that often
parents are overwhelmed by their position in life. They work too hard to provide
the basics of food, shelter and clothing without much time or money for anything
else. It isn't easy and doesn't always seem fair. Those at the bottom of the economic
ladder often tend to stay there.
My meeting produced a variety of emotions
in myself. I was pleased that people at a national level were actively concerned
over the heath of our nation's kids, but I was saddened by their lack of ability
to do a lot of things they wanted to do for one reason or another.
I was
not discouraged from pursuing my concept, not at all. In fact I was encouraged
to keep on going. I truthfully believe that unless we attempt to solve the present
health issues that relate to our children, we will be forced to pay for them for
many years to come.
Pennywise and pound foolish is very apt for this situation.
Unless we want to have untold numbers of fairly young unhealthy, obese citizens
who have had or will have a stroke or heart attack we need to look at the core
cause of the problem.
If we have to look to our local school boards to
get involved in nutrition and classes on health, isn't the end result better for
us than learning how to figure the volume of a sphere?
The people in
Washington are not bad people; they are just faced with challenges which may be
out of their range to do anything about. We are at the bottom of the ladder. The
step to helping our children and grandchildren starts with us. My children are
all grown, but I have grandchildren. I need to stay alert and give input into
my local schools to make certain they are looking at ways and methods to teach
young students how to take care of themselves.
Especially when their
parents won't. |
©
Peary Perry
Letters From North
America >
January 30, 2007 column
Syndicated weekly in 80 newspapers
Comments go
to www.pearyperry.com |
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Perry's
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