As one of the many outgrowths of the sweeping federal health care
law, health insurances and employers must now pay the cost of screening 1. ___________
children for obesity and providing them with appropriate counseling.
With about one in three children in America obese and overweight,2. ___________
the need for such programs is clear. But experts say, creating them will
be challenging. More than intensive hospital-based programs, few proven 3. ___________
models exist for helping children and adolescents achieve and maintain a
healthier weight, and researchers do not even fully understand the factors
that contributed the rapid rise in childhood obesity in recent years.4. ___________
While there are many community efforts aimed at getting every child
to eat better and exercise more, including Michelle Obama’s “Let’s Move”
initiative, there is also growing demand for programs help children who 5. ___________
are already seriously overweight. WellPoint and the UnitedHealth Group,
another large insurer, are experimenting with the new approaches, and 6. ___________
even Weight Watchers says it is working to develop a program for children
and teenagers. Drug companies and medical device makers are also testing
some products for children. 7. ___________
Adults have a difficult enough time lose weight, and the issues are 8. ___________
even more complicated with children and teenagers, experts say. Children
are still growing, and the goal of any program maybe to help them grow 9. ___________
into a healthier weight rather than to actually gain pounds. Experts also10. __________
say that to be successful, programs need to focus on the family as a whole,
changing what everybody eats and how much time they are all active, not
sitting in front of a computer screen or television.