Childhood Obesity: A Case Study

Socioeconomic Factors: Rarely is childhood obesity caused by a medical condition. A child’s environment is very complex and includes family, peers, school, community/neighborhoods, and society at large, as filtered through media, advertising, and prevailing social norms. Socioeconomic status is an important determinant of standard of living and health status, as it influences the incidence and prevalence of various health conditions such as childhood obesity. Several ways of measuring socioeconomic status have been proposed, and most of them include some quantification of family income, parental education, neighborhoods, and healthy food accessibility.

Poverty has a major impact on a child’s health. Low-income families cannot always gain access to good housing, education, and many other things that are basic life necessities. As a result, they are often forced to settle in a neighborhood characterized by social exclusion that has limited infrastructure for a healthy environment. These neighborhoods frequently lack full-service grocery stores and farmers’ markets where residents can buy a variety of healthy and high-quality fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and low-fat dairy products.4 The
Department of Agriculture conducted a 1-year study to assess the magnitude of areas with limited access to affordable and nutritious food. The study found that 23.5 million people live in low-income neighborhoods that are more than 1 mile away from a supermarket or large grocery store. Also, the study found that these poor neighborhoods had half as many supermarkets as wealthy neighborhoods have. Furthermore, the study revealed that eight percent of residents in low income areas are African American compared to 31 percent of whites.5 In West Louisville, Kentucky, where the low-income African American neighborhoods are located, there is only one supermarket for every 25,000 residents, compared to the county average of one supermarket for every 12,500