'Tis the Season

According to a study conducted by Texas A&M International University, throughout this holiday season Americans will consume an extra 619 calories per day between Thanksgiving and New Year’s. On Thanksgiving Day alone, the average American ingests between 4,000 - 5,000 calories. How much food is that? Well, let’s just say that a person would need to walk 30 miles in order to burn off that much energy. Incredible!

At the same time, poor nutrition is one of the main killers of young children around the world. A recent United Nations’ report states that hunger is stunting hundreds of millions of children in the developing world, and more than 90 percent of them live in Africa and Asia.

“Two hundred million children under the age of 5 in the developing world suffer from chronic undernutrition,” the report reads. “Reducing and eliminating malnutrition is feasible. Unless attention is paid to addressing the causes of child and maternal undernutrition today, the costs will be considerably higher tomorrow.”

And back in the United States, obesity among children in some age groups has tripled in the past 20 years.

Perhaps 'tis the season to address the problem.