40 percent of CPS students are overweight, study says

Reuters Health reports 40 percent of CPS students, participating in a national study, are obese, and many underestimate their weight.

Of the 448 students in grades 5 to 8, more than 62 percent of the overweight boys and nearly 31 percent of the overweight girls listed their weight as normal or underweight, Dr. Youfa Wang, at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore and colleagues found. The participants attended one of four Chicago Public Schools.

Compared with boys and girls not trying to lose weight, those who said they were trying to lose weight were not eating a healthier diet or increasing their physical activities, Wang and colleagues report in BMC Public Health, a journal published by BioMed Central.

Previous studies have shown that one-quarter of Chicago kindergartners were overweight or obese. This Johns Hopkins study found that students weren't eating enough healthy foods (perhaps because nachos are a menu item at CPS schools?)

Forty-three percent of the students they were trying to lose weight. Yet, again Wang's group did not find a greater vegetable and fruit consumption or level of physical activity this group compared with those not trying to lose weight.

"In fact," Wang and colleagues report, "boys who reported trying to lose weight still spent more time watching TV than those who did not."