Diabetes News
Chartered by the American Diabetes Association, New Organization Incorporates Shaping America's Youth Program and Partners With the North American Association for the Study of Obesity
ALEXANDRIA, Va., Aug. 1 (PRNewswire) — The American Diabetes Association (ADA) announced today the creation of Shaping America's Health: Association for Weight Management and Obesity Prevention, with a mission to prevent excess weight and obesity and facilitate a better scientific understanding of weight management. The new organization will issue new clinical guidelines and address public health challenges through evidence-based initiatives.
"Shaping America's Health: Association for Weight Management and Obesity Prevention will provide leadership and authoritative information to help families and communities make improved nutrition and greater physical activity a priority, especially for children," said Michael Jensen, MD, President of the new organization and professor of medicine at Mayo Medical School, Rochester, Minnesota. "It also will develop clinical guidelines and best practices for health care professionals working with individuals to better manage their weight."
The new organization will immediately begin addressing the public health challenges of obesity through its first initiative, Shaping America's Youth (SAY). The SAY initiative was initially launched in November 2003 as a public-private partnership, with the support of founding corporate supporters Campbell Soup Company, McNeil Nutritionals, LLC, a Johnson & Johnson company, and Nike, Inc.
The SAY initiative was conceived in 2003 in cooperation with the Office of the Surgeon General, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services; the American Academy of Pediatrics; Academic Network; the Nutrition Department of the University of California at Davis; and the American Diabetes Association. Today, the FedEx Corporation and Cadbury Schweppes are welcomed to Shaping America's Health: Association for Weight Management and Obesity Prevention as the newest corporate supporters. Coordination and management of the SAY initiative since its inception has been the responsibility of Academic Network, LLC, Portland, OR.
"Our nation's weight gain is resulting in long-term health consequences, especially for our youngest citizens," said U.S. Surgeon General Richard H. Carmona, M.D., M.P.H., FACS. "The good news is that science-based solutions and public-private partnerships like Shaping America's Health are intensifying our ongoing nationwide efforts to increase disease prevention in ways that are accessible to every family, school, and community. We must continue collaborations across all sectors of American life to increase health literacy about the importance of daily physical activity and healthy eating."
In the coming months, the Association's SAY initiative plans to hold four large regional town hall meetings that will engage a diverse cross-section of more than 1,000 concerned citizens in each city. Events are currently scheduled for Memphis (September 2005) and Dallas (October 2005).
"These town hall meetings will provide critical grassroots input to build the foundation of a National Action Plan that will promote common language, goals, and standards to foster 'best practices' from one family to a neighborhood, one school to an entire district, and one community to the entire nation," said SAY Executive Director David McCarron, MD, FACP.
To help communities and organizations easily learn about others' efforts for addressing obesity in children, the SAY initiative has developed a national registry of nearly 2,300 childhood physical activity, nutrition and weight management programs, and a searchable database of 1,000 programs available now at http://www.shapingamericasyouth.org.
To develop clinical guidelines and best practices for health care professionals, the new organization will work in partnership with the North American Association for the Study of Obesity (NAASO), the leading scientific society dedicated to the study of obesity, to recruit scientists and clinicians who are experts in obesity and metabolism. Through this partnership, experts will serve as volunteers on committees that will review the scientific and medical literature, issue guidance for health care professionals who treat patients with excess weight or obesity, and publish research through NAASO's existing peer-reviewed journal, Obesity Research.
"NAASO's partnership with Shaping America's Health: Association for Weight Management and Obesity Prevention represents the type of alliance needed to have an impact on obesity," said Louis Aronne, M.D., President of NAASO and clinical professor of Medicine at Weill-Cornell Medical College. "The new organization will greatly amplify our efforts to keep the medical community and public informed about obesity and obesity research."
Shaping America's Health: Association for Weight Management and Obesity Prevention will be based in Alexandria, Virginia. It will have a close working relationship with the ADA but is separately incorporated. For more information about the new organization, visit http://www.obesityprevention.org or call (703) 253-4808.