No Fats for Children is Dangerous

No Fats for Children is Dangerous - Children need fats in their diet. If you think you can help your little child become a fashion model, that's very risky. A new research showed that parents who eliminate all types of fats from their children's alimentation could cause serious health issues for their kids.

It is well known fact that some amount of 'good' fats, like olive and sunflower oils, is crucial for proper growth and development. But the increasing children obesity level has pushed many families to adopt low-fat diets for their children. The number of overweight children has doubled in ten years, now 25 % of the children aged 11-15 being classified as obese - so fat that their health is threatened.

The new research reveals that children burn more fat than adults do, related to each calorie spent, so that they store fat with more difficulty. This means the parents do not need to go to extremes.

The team led by Dr John Kostyak at the Pennsylvania State University assessed the burning rate of body fat in ten children aged six to ten, and in ten adults. All the subjects were middle weighed relatively to their age and sex. They were given the same common American diet for three days before the tests, even if the adults received larger meals.

The subjects' oxygen consume and carbon dioxide residue, as also heat production, were measured in a calorimeter room and a hood system, for nine hours on three separate days at a low physical activity level (like watching movies or reading).

The researchers also counted the nitrogen levels in the volunteers' urine to see how much fat they burned. The total fat burned level in a day was the same for both children and adults. This meant that children burned much more fat linked to the energy they used, in grams of burned fat per calorie of energy consume, about 50 % more. Women and girls burned more fat than men and boys of similar age did.

Other researches had shown that dietary fats are essential for normal growth, as they contain fat-soluble vitamins (like A and D), vital for the development of eyesight, bones and other organs. "Sufficient fat must be included in the diet for children to support normal growth and development.", said Kostyak.

"Children need the fatty acids and omega 3 found in fat, and fat soluble vitamins A,D and E for growth, development and eyesight. There is a risk parents could think that all fat is bad for their children - some years ago we had a phenomenon known as Muesli Belt syndrome where parents went to extremes with food that didn't contain all the nutrients they need." said Jacqui Lowdon, of the British Dietetic Association.

"35 % of calories from a healthy diet should come from fat, ideally polyunsaturated and mono-unsaturated fats such as olive and sunflower oils. These set up healthy eating patterns for life", she added.


Source: news.softpedia.com