ATLANTA - At a time when the number of overweight children is soaring, Weight Watchers is tightening their access to its program.
The weight management program has begun requiring a doctor's note and a weight goal before enrolling children aged 10 to 16. The diet's food provisions may not be appropriate for children and might even cause them to rebel and gain more weight, says Weight Watchers chief scientist Karen Miller-Kovach.
The 40-year-old program previously required medical permission only for children younger than 10.
"While we have assumed forever that what works for adults is what's best for kids, now we have evidence that maybe that's not the case," Kovach says. "We're learning a tremendous amount about what doesn't work. What we're still working hard to find is what does work."
One of the few areas that researchers can point to as successful in helping kids manage weight is restricting TV viewing and having parents who eat right and are physically active. Serving as a positive role model has been shown to influence children's food choices.
The number of overweight American children has grown significantly over the last decade, with 15 percent of children ages 6 to 19 considered too heavy, and 10.4 percent of kids ages 2 to 5. A rise in overweight children and related health problems, such as Type 2 diabetes, have caused a number of health and nutrition organizations to devote more research to what makes kids gain weight and how to reverse the trend.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is working with the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American Dietetic Association to develop programs to prevent children ages 3 and older from becoming overweight.
Prevention holds greater promise than treatment for the epidemic of overweight kids, says William H. Dietz, director of the CDC's Division of Nutrition and Physical Activity.
"Once you have an overweight person," Dietz says, "it's very difficult to get them back to a normal weight."
Asking for medical permission will ensure that parents and a primary care provider think about whether Weight Watchers' combination of education, physical activity and food choice guidelines are a good match for the child, Kovach says.
Less than 5 percent of Weight Watchers' clients are children. The international program hasn't studied the long-term effect of its diet on children's weight, but is starting some research.
In a couple of years, Weight Watchers might remove the restricted access if it finds that its plan does work effectively for long-term as well as short-term weight loss in adolescents, Kovach says.
Elizabeth Lee writes for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
