Developing advocacy campaign – Child Obesity Essay
Developing advocacy campaign – Child Obesity Essay
To prepare:
Select a population health issue of interest to you and identify the population affected by the issue.
Locate two scholarly articles, each of which provides a description of an effective health advocacy campaign that addresses your issue. The articles need to focus on two different advocacy campaigns.
Analyze the attributes of the two campaigns to determine what made them effective.
Reflect on a policy you could propose or suggest a change to a current policy to improve the health of the population you selected.
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Consider how you could develop an advocacy campaign, applying the attributes identified in similar, effective campaigns.
To complete:
For the Part 1 application (approximately 3 pages of content with a title page and references in APA format) address the following:
Describe your selected population health issue and the population affected by this issue.
Summarize the two advocacy campaigns you researched in this area.
Explain the attributes that made those campaigns effective.
Begin to develop a plan for a health advocacy campaign that seeks to create a new policy or change an existing policy with regard to the issue and population you selected. Be sure to include in your plan:
A description of the public health issue and proposed policy solution Developing advocacy campaign – Child Obesity Essay.
Specific objectives for the policy you want to be implemented
Begin to substantiate of your proposed campaign by data and evidence.
Developing an Advocacy Campaign
Introduction
The CDC (2015) reports that close to 13 million children in the USA (17% of their population) are suffering from obesity, with that population including individuals between 2 and 19 years of age. It is caused by changes in physical activity and dietary patterns that limit physical activity even as fatty foods consumption is increased Developing advocacy campaign – Child Obesity Essay. This is based on the understanding that obesity is by a body mass index (BMI) figure that exceeds 30 in which fat accumulates in the body to present both social implications, health risks, and economic effects. The social implications include: deleterious self-image; diminished self-esteem; suicidal tendencies; low self-esteem; low body satisfaction; eating disorders; and reduced quality of life. The health risks include expression of: type 2 diabetes; compromised glucose tolerance; apnea; stress; gout; gallstones; fatty liver; musculoskeletal disorders like osteoarthritis; hypertension; dyslipidemia; predisposition to cardiovascular diseases; pregancy complications when older; and cancers of the endometrium, breast and colon (Childhood Obesity Foundation, 2015). The economic effects take the form of direct costs, intangible costs and indirect costs to include; medical services; hospital-related costs; medication; and productivity losses (Katz et al., 2014). Therefore, childhood obesity is a source of medical and social concern that must be addressed as a priority within the USA.
Objective
Medical systems are intended to ensure that populations are healthy. In this case, childhood obesity has been identified as a source of concern that must be addressed with the intention of reducing its incidence. As such, the main objective of this paper is to identify the for an intervention plan regarding childhood obesity, as well as develop a feasible advocacy plan for childhood obesity Developing advocacy campaign – Child Obesity Essay.
Proposed Campaign by Evidence
There is a consensus that lack of government support has created a situation in which the society and environment creates conditions that are unfavorable for good diet and physical activity among children thereby allowing them to develop obesity. In essence, the lack of supportive government policies has created ideal conditions for the continued presentation of childhood obesity as a source of concern within the public arena. The federal government is aware of this concern and has since taken steps to address the issue. Key in the government efforts is the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010 that provides funding for school-focused national programs targeted at addressing the occurrence of obesity within the school children. Working through the Act, the government has been able to conceptualize, present, fund and support school feeding programs whereby school diets are optimized to ensure that schoolchildren are fed with healthy food. In fact, the program has adopted a school-focused approach, making it possible for school to provide their students with foods that have the correct nutrient values. One of the campaigns that the Act has supported is the Coordinated School Health Program (CSHP). The program focuses on eight interrelated and critical modules. The eight modules include involvement of the community and family, environmental safety and health, nutrition services, social services, health services, physical education and health education (King & Ling, 2015).
Other than the school-focused programs, there are advocacy campaigns that have applied a family-focused approach. One of this is the Let’s Move campaign that has identified the family unit as a valuable tool for addressing childhood obesity thereby adopting a family-focused approach. The campaign is based on the understanding that the readiness and motivation to change behavior must start in the family unit (Bumpus, Tagtow & Haven, 2015). Childhood Obesity Foundation (2015) identifies family-focused approach, as applied by Let’s Move, as a tool for bringing about effective and active lifestyle changes for the family as a unit and children as part of the unit that is influenced by the setting.
The two campaigns make it clear that any attempt targeted at addressing childhood obesity as a health concern must actively involve the community of which the children form a part to include the schools and family. They are grounded on the idea that healthy behavior is resultant of dynamic links between the social environment and influences realized from interpersonal, organization, community and policy level. This means that social, group and individual efforts should be combined to bring about behavioral change within the community as required for effective management of childhood obesity (Cohen et al., 2014). This makes it evident that any campaign targeted at reducing the incidence of childhood obesity must include social, group, and individual efforts. They use social marketing as a strategy to promote health behavior change, drawing on concepts that are typically applied in business marketing and modifying them to be used in promoting socially desirable health-related behaviors that include eating the right food and being physically active. They can use health workers to counsel the community members or even addresses in town meetings (McKenzie-Mohr, 2013). A prominent advantage of social marketing use in implementing community behavior change is that it introduces health promotion behaviors that do not rely on messages concerning health risk, and severity, as is the case in other approaches applied to implement community behavioral changes (Katz et al., 2014). Based on this analysis, the proposal is for the use of an advocacy plan that combines elements from both school-focused and family-focused campaigns to address childhood obesity. Amalgamating the two programs will address different populations with the same goal, thereby improving the possibility for success if they are used in combination.
References
Bumpus, K., Tagtow, A. & Haven, J. (2015). Let’s Move! Celebrates 5 Years. Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, 115(3), 338-341.
CDC (2015). Childhood Obesity Facts. Retrieved from https://www.cdc.gov/obesity/data/childhood.html
Childhood Obesity Foundation (2015). Childhood Obesity. Retrieved from http://www.childhoodobesityfoundation.ca/whatIsChildhoodObesity
Cohen, J., Richardson, S., Parker, E., Catalano, P. & Rimm, E. (2014). Impact of the New U.S. Department of Agriculture School Meal Standards on Food Selection, Consumption, and Waste. Am J Prev Med., 46(4), 388-394.
Katz, D., Elmore, J., Wild, D. & Lucan, S. (2014). Jekel’s Epidemiology, Biostatistics, Preventive Medicine, and Public Health (4th ed.). Philadelphia, PA: Elsevier Saunders.
King, K. & Ling, J. (2015). Results of a 3-year, nutrition and physical activity intervention for children in rural, low-socioeconomic status elementary schools. Health Education Research, 30(4), 647-659.
McKenzie-Mohr, D. (2013). Fostering Sustainable Behavior: An introduction to community-based social marketing (3rd ed.). Gabriola Island, British Columbia: New Society Publishers.
In the first assignment, you reflected on whether the policy you would like to promote could best be achieved through the development of new legislation, or a change in an existing law or regulation. Refine as necessary using any feedback from your first Developing advocacy campaign – Child Obesity Essay paper.
Contemplate how existing laws or regulations may affect how you proceed in advocating for your proposed policy.
Consider how you could influence legislators or other policymakers to enact the policy you propose.
Think about the obstacles of the legislative process that may prevent your proposed policy from being implemented as intended.
To complete:
Part Two will have approximately 3 pages of content plus a title page and references. Part Two will address the following:
Explain whether your proposed policy could be enacted through a modification of existing law or regulation or the creation of new legislation/regulation.
Explain how existing laws or regulations could affect your advocacy efforts. Be sure to cite and reference the laws and regulations using primary sources.
Provide an analysis of the methods you could use to influence legislators or other policymakers to support your policy. In particular, explain how you would use the “three legs” of lobbying in your advocacy efforts Developing advocacy campaign – Child Obesity Essay.
Summarize obstacles that could arise in the legislative process and how to overcome these hurdles.
Advocacy Campaign
Introduction
It is acknowledged that childhood obesity is a source of social, medical and financial concerns since it affects 17% of this population (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2015). In fact, the social concerns include deleterious self-image, diminished self-esteem, suicidal tendencies, low self-esteem, low body satisfaction, eating disorders, and reduced quality of life. The health concerns include predisposition to type 2 diabetes, compromised glucose tolerance, apnea, stress, gout, gallstones, fatty liver, musculoskeletal disorders like osteoarthritis, hypertension, dyslipidemia, predisposition to cardiovascular diseases, pregnancy complications when older, and cancers of the endometrium, breast and colon (Childhood Obesity Foundation, 2015). The economic concerns include direct, intangible and indirect costs linked with medical services, hospital-related costs, medication, and productivity losses (Katz et al., 2014). Following this awareness, there is a need for an advocacy plan that facilitates the presentation of a healthy diet while encouraging physical activity to preempt and reverse childhood obesity. The proposed advocacy plan intends to achieve this goal by using elements of both family-focuses and school-focused approaches the entail implementing a two pronged approach that targets children both at school and at home where they have the most social interactions Developing advocacy campaign – Child Obesity Essay.
Explain whether your proposed policy could be enacted through a modification of existing law or regulation or the creation of new legislation/regulation.
The proposed policy will be enacted by modifying an existing legislation. In this case, the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010 is intended for revision. As the Act stands, it advocates for a school-focused approach by allocated federal resources towards conceptualizing, presenting, funding and supporting school feeding programs across the USA. Through the Act’s mandate, school diets have been optimized to offer healthy foods to school children while also considering their nutrient needs. Although the Act has comprehensively improved obesity management in school environments through involving the community, environmental safety and health, nutrition services, social services, health services, physical education and health education (King & Ling, 2015), it can be faulted for only applying half measures by focusing on one social environment when there are many environments that should be addressed for a better outcomes. In fact, the campaign identifies the family as a social environment in which the children spend most of their time and take many meals. In fact, a typical school child will take two major meals at home (breakfast and dinner) on a typical school day while only taking one major meal in school (lunch). The implication is that the current framing of the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010 only has a direct influence on lunch as a major meal to imply that any gains made in school could easily be overturned by detriments in the breakfast and dinner meals presented at home. Besides the meals, the family unit has an influence on the child’s readiness and motivation to change behavior and adopt a healthier lifestyle. As such, there is a need for the Act to be revised to include provisions for a family-focused approach that target the family as a tool for influencing the school children to adopt healthy lifestyles.
Explain how existing laws or regulations could affect your advocacy efforts.
Revising the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010 will affect the advocacy efforts by availing resources for the plan. The Act makes provisions for federal funding to be allocated towards anti-obesity campaigns (King & Ling, 2015). Using the revised Act, the advocacy will gain access to the extensive government resources (including funding, personnel, linkages, and so on) to roll out nationwide with minimal resistance. This means that should the Act be revised to include a family-focused approach along with the school-focused approach, then its roll out would be easily implemented by the federal government.
Provide an analysis of the methods you could use to influence legislators or other policymakers to support your policy. In particular, explain how you would use the “three legs” of lobbying in your advocacy efforts.
The “three legs” of lobbying will be applied in seeking support for revising Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010 from legislators and policymakers. Firstly, direct lobbying will be applied by convincing professional health bodies and organizations concerned with childhood obesity to gain their support. For instance, support will be sought from the American National Association since the advocacy plan has been conceptualized by a nurse who is a member of the organization. Secondly, grassroots lobbying will be applied by rallying communities to support the revision through presenting them with verified tangible data that shows the merits of the plan. This would include holding community forums and discussions where the community members are allowed to question the plan even as it is presented. Finally, political lobbying will be applied by seeking help from legislators to place the revision through the legislative process. This would entail framing the revision in a realistic manner that does not conflict with other existing legislation then getting legislators to endorse its passage (Goodwin, K., Ainsworth & Goodwin, 2013). Applying the three approaches to lobbying is anticipated to influence opinion and gain support for the advocacy plan Developing advocacy campaign – Child Obesity Essay.
Summarize obstacles that could arise in the legislative process and how to overcome these hurdles.
A major obstacle is the laws concerning the ethics of lobbying. There are fine guidelines governing how lobbying is conducted when seeking support for a legislative change. To overcome this hurdle, the rules governing how lobbying is conducted will be reviewed with focus being on credibility (Goodwin, K., Ainsworth & Goodwin, 2013). Another obstacle is the need for funding to carry out the lobbying. Funds are necessary for coordinating support. This obstacle will be overcome by presenting a proposal to professional organizations who would then fund the lobbying efforts Developing advocacy campaign – Child Obesity Essay.
References
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2015). Childhood Obesity Facts. Retrieved from https://www.cdc.gov/obesity/data/childhood.html
Childhood Obesity Foundation (2015). Childhood Obesity. Retrieved from http://www.childhoodobesityfoundation.ca/whatIsChildhoodObesity
Goodwin, K., Ainsworth, S. & Goodwin, E. (2013). Lobbying and Policymaking: The public pursuit of private interests. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications.
Katz, D., Elmore, J., Wild, D. & Lucan, S. (2014). Jekel’s Epidemiology, Biostatistics, Preventive Medicine, and Public Health (4th ed.). Philadelphia, PA: Elsevier Saunders.
King, K. & Ling, J. (2015). Results of a 3-year, nutrition and physical activity intervention for children in rural, low-socioeconomic status elementary schools. Health Education Research, 30(4), 647-659. Developing advocacy campaign – Child Obesity Essay.
