Fit Kids Coalition Wants to Stop the
Supersizing of Oklahoma’s Student Body Integris
Health CEO leads the way to healthier choices for kids
—Shauna Lawyer Struby
 |
| INTEGRIS Health President and CEO Stanley
Hupfeld and students at Western Village Academy were on hand
to watch Governor Brad Henry sign a bill into law to curb childhood
obesity. |
The black-and-white photo of a puffy faced kid with a serious expression
and sprinkling of freckles across his nose captures your attention
right away. He could be anybody’s child, the kid next door,
your nephew, even your own child.
Then you see the provocative headline, “How to Stop Supersizing
the Student Body” and facts about the health risks associated
with childhood obesity, the growing crisis, possible solutions.
The experts catch your eye next, scrolling photos of pediatricians
accompanied by quotes about the complications associated with childhood
obesity.
The website’s clickable words “Wake up” launch
you further into the plethora of information and once there, an
impressively organized array of information designed to compel action
takes a tenacious hold. And reading through the info, you begin
to understand just how pervasive obesity has become and why is it
so threatening to Oklahoma on a number of levels.
What you’re reading isn’t the website of “Good
Morning America,” CNN or The New York Times. It’s a
homegrown, 100-percent Oklahoma-initiated website organized and
backed by the Oklahoma Fit Kids Coalition, more than 40 organizations
who take Oklahoma’s growing obesity problem very seriously.
The Fit Kids coalition is the brainchild of Integris CEO and president,
Stan Hupfeld. Hupfeld heads the state’s largest Oklahoma-owned
health system with hospitals, rehabilitation centers, physician
clinics, mental health facilities, independent living centers and
home health agencies throughout much of the state.
In a recent interview he noted that after successful work on State
Question 713 in 2004, which raised cigarette taxes by a net 55-cents
per pack and is estimated to raise $200 million a year for health-related
initiatives, Fit Kids turned their attention to Oklahoma’s
growing obesity crisis.
A number of Integris pediatricians had expressed concern about
the number of pre-teens and teens they were seeing with Type II
diabetes, historically a disease seen in adults aged 40 plus, often
as a result of obesity. Hupfeld says as the doctors began to look
at national statistics, they were alarmed at what they found. The
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported an increase
in diabetes of 33 percent nationally, with 8 - 45% percent of children
with newly diagnosed diabetes having Type II diabetes.
Further, as the U.S. population becomes increasingly overweight,
CDC researchers reported they expect Type II diabetes to appear
more frequently in younger, pre-pubescent children. The statistics
dovetailed with what Integris pediatricians were seeing in their
practices in Oklahoma.
In addition to the many unpleasant and often life-threatening consequences
obesity exacts on individuals and families, obesity threatens the
economic health of Oklahoma and the nation. For instance, the Washington,
D.C.-based National Business Group on Health (NBGH) estimates obesity
costs employers $12 billion a year. Armed with such data, Hupfeld
said Integris felt compelled to act.
“We began to ask ourselves basic questions. As the largest
provider of health services in Oklahoma, ought we to be taking proactive
positions in public health issues? And if not us, then who?”
says Hupfeld. “Our answer was, ‘Yes,’ we should
take a more proactive role.”
Hupfeld led the charge in forming the coalition as a public interest
group that could affect opinions and legislation. He also serves
as chairman of Fit Kids.
Once the coalition formed and began meeting, they recognized obesity
as a societal and family problem but also realized that as with
any problem it’s important to find a starting point.
“We thought the easiest place to grab hold was in the school
system. While at the same time we understand it’s certainly
family and societal based, schools shouldn’t make the problem
worse,” says Hupfeld.
Working with several partners, and contracting with the Oklahoma
Institute for Child Advocacy to provide administrative services,
the Coalition researched what other states were doing, collected
data, and conducted field work, actually going to a middle school
in the Oklahoma City metro area and taping the food being served
in the cafeteria.
“We were absolutely appalled by what our kids were being
fed both in the regular line and particularly in vending machines,”
said Hupfeld. “In our judgment the schools were in fact making
the obesity issue worse by what they fed kids both in the cafeteria
and in vending machines and by the fact that many of them had eliminated
physical education as part of their curriculum.”
The coalition’s solution? When it makes sense, propose legislation
to effect change. And during the last two legislative years, Fit
Kids has done just that, leading the charge on three bills, all
three of which have passed.
The first, SB 1627 created the Healthy and Fit Kids Act of 2004
by providing for the establishment of local Healthy and Fit School
Advisory Committees, which get parents involved first-hand in working
with school administrators to address health and fitness issues.
The second, SB 265, limits students’ access to junk food
by mandating healthier food choices for vending machines by 2007.
And the third, SB 312, addresses physical fitness by requiring mandatory
physical and health education in grade schools and elective physical
education in junior high and high schools.
In such a short time the ability to overcome powerful opposition
not only demonstrates the persuasive skills of the coalition, but
shows the issue reached critical mass in the minds of the public,
says Anne Roberts, executive director of the Oklahoma Institute
for Child Advocacy.
“For an organization as young as Fit Kids to be able to
be so successful at the legislature is a testament to the urgency
of the issue and the widespread support we got from parents, superintendents
and physicians,” says Roberts.
The greatest opposition to the Coalition’s work came when
they addressed unhealthy snacks in vending machines. Schools dependent
on revenue from vending machines to fund vital programs like debate
and band, as well as vending machine and snack companies, vigorously
fought what they saw as a direct assault on their economic livelihood.
The Coalition was able to work with the schools, vending machine
and snack companies, contending that providing healthier snack foods
wouldn’t change the revenue stream of the schools and companies.
“We’re not asking Pepsi to go away; we’re asking
Pepsi to replace bad Pepsi products with good Pepsi products,”
says Roberts. “I think it’s a win/win for everyone.”
Three for three in the legislative arena, Fit Kids is contemplating
the horizon and their next move. Hupfeld says the group is looking
at a number of issues: how to quantify healthier kids through tracking
BMIs (body mass index), the current easy access older students have
to fast-food vendors on campuses, and implementing healthier food
in cafeterias.
He fully realizes the topics are controversial and jokes about being
labeled “food Nazis,” but says in the end the process
of debate on the issue itself is healthy, a means of getting all
the stakeholders to come to the table and work on what’s best
for the kids.
Roberts maintains a key ingredient to the Coalition’s success
is the coordinated efforts of so many partners, members and individuals
with courage.
In particular, Roberts credits Integris and the vision of individuals
like Hupfeld for forming and leading Fit Kids.
Ruminating on the lessons learned in the short life of this remarkable
organization, Hupfeld meanwhile, appears well suited for the next
battle in helping Oklahomans live healthier lives.
“This is really a textbook case of a public health issue
getting enough organization and impetus— which includes money,
time and people— that you can win out over the vested interests,
and that‘s never easy,” says Hupfeld. “You start
with a good cause, something that makes sense to do, and you put
some organization behind it, raise an effective following that will
call and write letters, and you can make changes.”
Shauna Lawyer Struby is an Oklahoma-City based writer with
an interest in food and agriculture issues.
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