Michigan officials meet at Ypsilanti park to announce $18.25M statewide plan to fight obesity
State and local officials look on as Rochelle Hurst, manager of cardiovascular health, nutrition and physical activity section for the Michigan Department of Community Health, details the state's new plan to reduce and prevent obesity in Michigan during a meeting Monday in the Senior Citizens Center on Congress Street in Ypsilanti.
Amy Biolchini | AnnArbor.com
The plan is a result of Gov. Rick Snyder's charge to the Michigan Department of Community Health to reduce and prevent obesity in the state.
The location for the announcement was no accident.
Michigan Department of Community Health staff wanted to showcase the initiatives taken by Washtenaw County Public Health to engage the public in healthful activities at Recreation Park in Ypsilanti - including installing community gardens, walking paths and replacing the basketball hoops.
“This really is a such a great testament to what happens here in the county,” said State Sen. Rebekah Warren, D-Ann Arbor, on Monday in Ypsilanti.
Community engagement on behalf of local groups is the crux of the state’s plan to turn the obesity epidemic on its head.
The “Michigan Health and Wellness 4 x 4 plan” announced Monday focuses on four healthful behaviors - a healthful diet, regular exercise, annual physicals, no tobacco use - and four health measures to watch: body mass index, blood pressure, cholesterol and blood sugar.
The plan emphasizes the importance of local community groups to motivate people to make health a personal priority. The state aims to create 46 “community coalitions” to make this a reality. Olga Dazzo, director of the Michigan Department of Community Health, could not elaborate as to how the members would be chosen.
Olga Dazzo, director of the Michigan Department of Community Health, holds a copy of the new statewide plan designed to reduce and prevent obesity in Michigan Monday outside of the Senior Citizens Center in Ypsilanti.
Amy Biolchini | AnnArbor.com
Officials are still working on benchmarks for incentive programs for healthful behaviors, but they will be forthcoming, Dazzo said.
In Michigan, 32 percent of adults and 17 percent of youth are obese. The state continually ranks as one of the top 10 heaviest states in the nation -- although Washtenaw County is one of the healthiest counties in the Michigan, according to 2012 data.
Dazzo said she’s very familiar with how difficult it is to lose weight.
“I went through the struggles of identifying that I was obese,” Dazzo said, explaining how she’s lost about 40 pounds so far and has brought her body mass index to a healthier level.
Hoping to instill “social change,” the plan takes a unified approach across all departments to address a “public health crisis,” Dazzo said.
The MDCH plans to partner with employers, trade and professional organizations - including restaurant associations, educational institutions.
State government departments have specific marching orders as a part of the plan:
- Department of Education: Implement Michigan Nutrition Standards in school districts and on campuses, develop state policy for include physical education during the school day as well as before and after school, facility-level interventions
- Department of Agriculture and Rural Development: Strengthen the farm-to-school network, collaborate on a new program beginning this year - Pure Michigan FIT (Feeding Infants and Toddlers, 0-5) that targets nutrition education for primary caregivers of babies and toddlers
- Department of Transportation: Develop a "complete streets" policy (roadways that are planned, designed and constructed to provide safe access by car, truck, transit, assistive device, foot or bicycle) and give consideration to communities that have implemented such policies for federal grants
- Department of Human Services: Develop nutrition standards, physical activity requirements and screen-time limits for licensed family and group child care homes
- Department of Natural Resources: Further involvement to bring environmental education to K-12 classrooms and classrooms into the outdoors
- Michigan Economic Development Corporation: Establish promotional opportunities with trade and restaurant organizations that adopt the “4 x 4 Plan”
Chronic diseases from obesity are estimated to cost the state about $3.1 billion in 2008, according to a news release from the MDCH.
Governmental departments will also be encouraged to implement more healthful practices.
In attendance at the Monday news conference was Washtenaw County Administrator Verna McDaniel, who said she plans to work with the 1,300 workers the county employees to make a more “aggressive” plan to promote healthful behavior in departmental workplaces.
“I think it’s best practices at its best,” McDaniel said. “It really is going to take all of us to work together.”
McDaniel noted working with the restaurant’s association and creating an incentive program for employees could be possible next steps for the county to promote more healthful lifestyles.
“I’m extremely proud of our public health department,” McDaniel said.
The Recreation Park in Ypsilanti has made use of a number of Building Healthy Community state funds - including installing new basketball hoops, a walking path and a community garden.
The community garden at the Recreation Park on Congress Street in Ypsilanti.
Amy Biolchini | AnnArbor.com
“We’re eager to embrace the state’s wellness plan,” Bacolor said.
After the first five years of implementing the plan, Dazzo said she hopes a smaller percentage of the population will be overweight.
The initiative’s success now relies on the state’s ability to find funding for it. Dazzo said she believes several foundations and organizations that would benefit from a healthier population are likely to contribute to the effort.
Amy Biolchini covers Washtenaw County, health and environmental issues for AnnArbor.com. Reach her at (734) 623-2552, amybiolchini@annarbor.com or on Twitter.
Comments
snapshot
Wed, Jun 6, 2012 : 4:17 a.m.
Fast and fattening foods are cheap, quick, and easy. Healthy foods are expensive, require lengthy and frequent shopping trips, and preperation times that only the "affluent" have both time and money to spend. Availability and affordability should be the starting point, any other program is a waste of money whose only accomplishment will be back patting recognition.
jns131
Mon, Aug 13, 2012 : 9:16 p.m.
Not necessarily. You can buy a salad from those grocery store deli counters and get a really nice salad or what ever for less then $5. A salad for 2 and something from the deli or meat counter. Gotta really think when time is short and you need something quick and healthy. I have done it. So can you.
Jim Van Buren
Tue, Jun 5, 2012 : 2:49 p.m.
One of the best way to fight obesity is to ban the use of bridge cards at fast food establishments, but they will ban sugary drinks and tax who know what before that will ever happen.
jns131
Mon, Aug 13, 2012 : 7:28 p.m.
Doesn't NYC do that? I heard that some where someone was doing that already. No junk on food stamps and bridge cards. Must be healthy. Can't remember where.
snapshot
Wed, Jun 6, 2012 : 4:23 a.m.
bridge cards can't be used at fast food joints, nor can they be used to purchase many "prepared' ready to eat foods. No profitable fast food establishment would jeopardize a lucrative franchise to facilitate such illegal use since they'd have to bypass the computer processing feature which would involve a multitude of other fraud charges. Educate yourself.
JMA2Y
Tue, Jun 5, 2012 : 12:49 p.m.
The HBO series "The Weight of the Nation" can be found on YouTube and is a must see in order to better understand all the elements that play into obesity. It's not as simple as choosing a correct diet. It tells of amazing stats-unhealthy, fast food like food in schools where kids consume 50% or more of their daily calories-it's no longer the tray with the sectional divides where food is spooned out on it for the kids; how food is processed, how food subsidies encourage corn, high fructose corn syrup, and other grains that make processing food and therefore fast food and snacks, cheaper than fresh. There are no fresh food subsidies for farmers. This makes fresh more expensive. The profit margin on pop and sweets is 60-80% and on fresh is about 10% approx. We get larger portions in restaurants due to the overall subsidies to farmers. Trade policies encourage foreign growers to send in fresh food but not encourage US farmers to farm it. Inner city stores often are the corner stores full of snacks. Parents are the ones who buy snacks and fast food and processed foods and raise their kids on it, who raise their kids on it. Current generation of kids is the most overweight, with high levels of type 2 diabetes-which was called adult onset diabetes due to age/diet but now seen in kids as young as 10. This generation stands a greater chance of getting heart disease at a young age which will affect them as adults in their 30s, and high bp, and stands a greater chance than previous generations of dying in their 50s. In general, due to farm/trade policies, US govt. encouraging the wrong foods being processed and available price wise to families, food we allow schools to sell, and the high use of regular sugared pop, juice, flavored waters (by the way-the show points out juice and flavored waters have no more nutrition than pop and about the same calories) we have a growing obesity problem in children especially.
clownfish
Tue, Jun 5, 2012 : 12:35 p.m.
Can you imagine the outrage if Obama did this? Oh, right, Michelle WAS roundly ridiculed for talking about healthful eating. I have lost track of the GOP flip flops on everything from mandated insurance to concerns about debt to war and on and on...
jns131
Mon, Aug 13, 2012 : 7:27 p.m.
That is why she is at the Olympics. Not promoting and touting what she is preaching here at home.
meddler76
Tue, Jun 5, 2012 : 12:07 p.m.
We've lost our corporate mind if we think that the Government is an effective agent for change of personal discipline.
meddler76
Tue, Jun 5, 2012 : 11:26 a.m.
Just give me my money back. Seriously.
chris
Tue, Jun 5, 2012 : 4:22 a.m.
I think it is wonderful to have our Ypsilanti, Normal Park Rec Center as an example of a community being pro-active about introducing/promoting good health and a healthy life style. Neighborhoods are communities. Each community has its own culture. If we want a culture that participates in healthy living, I believe making a place for it to happen is an essential step.
KMHall
Tue, Jun 5, 2012 : 2:40 a.m.
Busy people can't always arrange the healthiest meals for their families but no child ever needs to drink pop.
jns131
Mon, Aug 13, 2012 : 7:26 p.m.
Wanna bet? I am probably the busiest parent on the planet and yet, I have a rule, no fast food. I have stuff in the freezer that can go on the foreman and done in in 15 minutes. Or BBQ sauce and ham and whole wheat? Fruit or vegetable. Can be done. So I do not want to hear how busy you are. I am not ready for school to start and the hectic lifestyle to begin.
Mick52
Tue, Jun 5, 2012 : 2:20 a.m.
Good news that someone in politics is putting some burden on the individual to help lower health care costs. The Affordable Health Care Act, puts the burden on business. With the emphasis on getting slim there is a growing movement to add obesity as a protected right. Only one state however has laws protecting the obese and that state is, yup, Michigan.
JMA2Y
Tue, Jun 5, 2012 : 10:33 p.m.
http://www.legislature.mi.gov/(S(alqf1m45vnqioy2sjdfsiiic))/mileg.aspx?page=getobject&objectname=mcl-act-453-of-1976&highlight= He could be referring to the 1976 Elliott Lasen Act last ameneded in 93. Prohibits discrimination on weight and other factors.
Carrie Rheingans
Tue, Jun 5, 2012 : 3:13 p.m.
Mick, I'm really interested in learning more about the Michigan laws that protect the obese - can you point me to where I can read the language online, or eat least the bill number/year passes? Thank you!
Dog Guy
Tue, Jun 5, 2012 : 2:06 a.m.
How is $18,250,000,00 of pork every year going to make us thinner?
KeepingItReal
Mon, Jun 4, 2012 : 9:21 p.m.
I dropped into a local party store recently to purchase a lottery ticket and a bottle of water and it was amazing the number of sugar drinks available in these stores. While the County is patting itself on the back about this grant, it needs to really focus on these party stores and what they are feeding our kids. You wouldn't be able to find this stuff on store shelves in any of the countries from which the owners and proprieties originated.
Are you serious?
Mon, Jun 4, 2012 : 9:15 p.m.
Call in "nanny state nonsense" or anything else you want, but the fact is that society as a whole pays for the results each of us makes on a daily basis. Obesity now costs more than the result of smoking. According to a recent report the annual costs of obesity start about $190 billion and go up from there. Guess who pays for that? http://www.forbes.com/sites/rickungar/2012/04/30/obesity-now-costs-americans-more-in-healthcare-costs-than-smoking/
Mick52
Tue, Jun 5, 2012 : 2:16 a.m.
Are you serious is absolutely correct. The cost of obesity related goes beyond healthcare. It also costs businesses that have to hire temporary employees to cover for off work ill employees.
Laurie Burg
Mon, Jun 4, 2012 : 9:48 p.m.
I pay for my medical insurance, thank you very much. You don't. Overly simplistic, judgmental "solutions" to a highly exaggerated problem. The reliance on BMI tells me they don't know what they are doing. As if all fat people needed was someone to say "oh honey, just walk once in a while, and put down the fast food." If it was as easy as skinny people make it out to be, do you really think people would still be fat? If you do, you are naive. I tell you what, you "pay for" my obesity, and I'll pay for your kids.
ferdcom
Mon, Jun 4, 2012 : 9:08 p.m.
My parents worried their children getting polio, measles, whooping cough, etc. Now the #1 children's health issue is fat. Let's shut down the pick-up, drop-off areas at the schools and have the kids walk a little.
jns131
Mon, Aug 13, 2012 : 7:23 p.m.
Great idea. Also? Make the bus drop off points a little farther as well.
Jon Wax
Mon, Jun 4, 2012 : 8:54 p.m.
"you're gonna need a bigger boat!" Peace
Laurie Burg
Mon, Jun 4, 2012 : 8:41 p.m.
How many JOBS does this create? More unfunded, nanny state nonsense. I neither need nor want my employer butting into my personal health care decisions.
Topher
Tue, Jun 5, 2012 : 1:39 a.m.
Exactly. We should be able to keep our fat butts. I want the biggest shelf butt, and I want the state to have to pay my medical bills since I can't afford health care. Or I want my employer to pay exorbitant amounts for the negative health effects from my obese body. I want my shelf butt to store another shelf butt on top of it! Who's with me? (Let's symbolically march online since I won't actually be able to walk anywhere)
Top Cat
Mon, Jun 4, 2012 : 8:19 p.m.
It seemed that back in the 1950s and 1960s there was a social stigma against being overweight. Unless people feel pressure from their peers and their surroundings to get active and minimize the "fast" food, I can't see how these programs will accomplish anything.
BornNRaised
Mon, Jun 4, 2012 : 8:08 p.m.
You can't throw money at a problem that starts with parenting your kids and simple motivation. If someone doesn't have the internal motivation not to shove cookies down their throat, throwing government money at that isn't going to do a thing other than take away from some other program that can actually do some good. Put down the x-box controller, stay our of the fast food joints, ride a bike, play a sport. If you're an adult, use some common sense and eat right.
javajolt1
Mon, Jun 4, 2012 : 8:07 p.m.
Are we going to ban 32oz and 64oz soft drinks like Bloomberg in NYC??
jns131
Mon, Aug 13, 2012 : 7:22 p.m.
Need to make those sizes 16 oz and nothing more.
aanative
Mon, Jun 4, 2012 : 10:21 p.m.
Didja even READ the article?
John Tuttle
Mon, Jun 4, 2012 : 6:20 p.m.
One would hope that part of this plan includes removing vending machines from elementary and middle schools, feeding kids less mass-produced fast-food garbage in those schools, and giving school children time to actually go outside at lunch and exercise.
jns131
Mon, Aug 13, 2012 : 7:21 p.m.
I am one of those parents that really is on the band wagon getting these things out of the schools. The only reason they are there is so schools can make money thru advertising these unhealthy items in their schools. Not a healthy way to do things, IMO.
Topher
Tue, Jun 5, 2012 : 1:36 a.m.
I wish every school would do this! Schools make money from these partnerships (In high school I remember Pepsi coming to our campus and giving out free merchandise). It's sad that money is chosen over students.
garrisondyer
Tue, Jun 5, 2012 : 1 a.m.
As a middle school teacher (not in MI, though), that'd be great!