Health officials support placing obese children in foster care

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Health officials support placing obese children in foster care before undergoing surgery.

LUFKIN, Texas (KTRE) -

If a child is obese and qualifies for weight loss surgery, some health experts believe they should be put in temporary foster care.

They feel it's more ethical than going under the knife.

http://www.ktre.com/story/15077654/health-officials


I had a really hard time not putting this in the "Crimes against Children" thread.
Has the entire world gone insane? Who in their right mind would take a child from a loving family and place then in an already overflowing, understaffed system, just because they are overweight?
Folks, we are in serious trouble here when the government has so much control that they can take our children, if they feel they don't meet the required standards.:banghead:
 
I think the stress of being in a foster home could cause additional weight gain.
Beware the Food Polizei.
 
I think the stress of being in a foster home could cause additional weight gain.
Beware the Food Polizei.

i agree with this. can you imagine all the problems they would add to the child. even if the child didn't gain additional weight the emotional problems that would be added. and you know the child would/could also develop an eating disorder because they would take the being taken away from birth family as something they've done wrong. so you could have a child that would think no one will want me if i'm "fat" so they would/could try to compensate for that so it doesn't happen again. it would definitely give the child the wrong message.
 
This sounds like something that would come out of California.
But TEXAS????
 
I have read where children were removed by the CPS and placed in foster care only to be killed in the foster home.! Texas has a broken CPS and I have seen some horrible things come from that department.

I know they pay very little and will take just about any employee who is willing to work there and then when the case goes to court, they take what this case workers says like it was gold or God's Holy Gospel. They make way too many mistakes for me to even consider this as a viable option.

Im worried about this country and for more reasons than just this....whose idea was this? Is this an Obama thing? that would serve us right if it was....
 
I would hope that the threat of having children removed and placed in foster care would shock parents into caring for their children's weight issues. IMO It is abuse.
 
I would hope that the threat of having children removed and placed in foster care would shock parents into caring for their children's weight issues. IMO It is abuse.

Abuse?
There are so many medical reasons some children are overweight.

It's nobody's business!
 
The first thing the government needs to do is make healthier food less costly.
We have a garden eat mostly fresh or frozen fruits and veggies, and i'm also an extreme couponer. I can get junk food food waaay cheaper than i can buy fresh fruits and veggies year round. Rarely is there coupons for skim milk, apples, meat, grapes, eggs, lettuce etc.. but fruit snacks with coupons you can get for free, hot pockets, banquet TV dinners for $.68 each and on and on. Thankfully we can afford the fruits and veggies, and i allow my kids 1 junk item a day since it's all about eating that stuff in small amounts, not banning it all together. But for poor people they seen to choose junk food rather than fresh stuff and I know it has to do with laziness sometimes, but i think it also has to do with cost.
MOO
 
Abuse?
There are so many medical reasons some children are overweight.

It's nobody's business!

Remember that little girl in New Mexico? Think she was 3yo and the state swooped in and took her away from her parents because of her weight. As it turned out, iirc, it was a medical issue and not anything to do with their parenting. All over the "free world", governments are overstepping more and more. I saw something in this vein about the British government overstepping on this issue just a few days ago. Enough already. MOO
 
That's right punish children who are already insecure. They should have a program where the entire family gets counseling . I know money is a problem but in the long run everyone will benefit. A lot of people don't know how to say no to their children. It's not that they want to see their child overweight, they just are not experts. This is a family problem and should be treated as one.
 
I want the body fat ratio of every single politician and court, federal, state, city employees, etc. measured. If he or she is not fit, then I want them immediately removed from office /jobs without pay. They have a period of time to get their body fat ratio, cholesterol, high blood pressure, diabetes, etc. under control. Let's try it for a year or two.

If it works well, then, I might even consider or think about temporarily removing very obese children from their parent/s.
 
I want the body fat ratio of every single politician and court, federal, state, city employees, etc. measured. If he or she is not fit, then I want them immediately removed from office /jobs without pay. They have a period of time to get their body fat ratio, cholesterol, high blood pressure, diabetes, etc. under control. Let's try it for a year or two.

If it works well, then, I might even consider or think about temporarily removing very obese children from their parent/s.

Good one epiphany. I'm with you, if anyone wants to experiment with something as personal as family problems than politicians should be the lab rat.
 
Remember that little girl in New Mexico? Think she was 3yo and the state swooped in and took her away from her parents because of her weight. As it turned out, iirc, it was a medical issue and not anything to do with their parenting. All over the "free world", governments are overstepping more and more. I saw something in this vein about the British government overstepping on this issue just a few days ago. Enough already. MOO

Yes I do remember that!
 
I know this is not just poor people so please nobody take offense. I would not allow junk food to be bought with food stamps.Maybe foods that have a certain nutritional quality should be the only things allowed in the food program?
 
ok im beginning to wonder just who some of these ppl think they are that they can make that call ..is this country becoming a dictatorship? i think ppl need to stop studying others so much and worry about important things such as jobs and abused children ect.. foods now adays are fattening .. and good food is too expensive to buy alot of kids are home alone because the parens have to both work to survive and they play video games , alot of us didnt have that stuff in our childhood.. not only that if a kid wants to go outside and play and your in well populated area they arnt safe ..wtf do they expect from these parents your damned if you do and damned if you dont ..some ppl cant afford houses so how can they garden? heh and if you have one in your front yard you get fined for it or even jailed the city officials in some states need to set up better priorities and cut out the stupid ones .. this is becoming beyond ridiculous .. i think if a kid is pulled out the home for stupid stuff like that then the person who is behind it should foot the bill for the foster care parents shouldnt have to if its against thier will or the child isnt being abused
 
I get why some health officials feel this way, but this is SO the wrong way to go about it.

There's a nationwide obesity epidemic among kids...and off the top of my head, I can think of tons of better ways to deal with it.
--Fully fund our schools, so things like recess and real physical education classes don't fall victim to cutbacks. Fully fund our schools so they don't have to allow soda machines, junk food machines, and sale of fast food in the lunchroom (at my local high school, there was a proposal to allow Taco Bell and other chains to sell right at the school--I honestly can't remember if it passed (I don't have kids), and my google skills are failing me right now...but really? Fast food IN THE SCHOOL?).

--As peeples said, make fresh food less costly. Also make it available. In some areas, especially if you are lacking in transportation, healthy food may not be easy to come by: the concept of a Food desert - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia is explained here.

-In my area, there's a program where folks can use foodstamps at the local farmers' markets. I think it's a *great* program, and if it isn't common, then it should be.

-Make sure families have access to decent medical care.

-Years ago, I used to work at a gas station/convenience store located near a high school. I usually worked nights, but the first time I worked a day shift I was shocked--the place was *packed* with high school kids buying absolute carp during the lunch hour. My high school had been a closed campus (you couldn't leave during the day)--it's different here. I don't think that was the reason my high school was a closed campus (I think it was open at one time, and some kids died in a car accident over lunch, at least that was the rumor), but I'm all for closed campuses.

Another point I have heard made on this issue--kids eat unhealthily for lots of reasons, some of which is advertising, culture, peer pressure, etc. These are things often beyond parents' control (well, you can limit kids' exposure to advertising (not owning a TV cuts down on it big time), but you can't eliminate it. Punishing individual parents for this seem really off the mark to me.

I could probably go on, but I won't :) . I also recognize that there are *lots* of things that cause obesity, and that bad eating habits are not the only cause--but the easiest one (IMO) to address.
 
Look at this from the standpoint of racism, and address it as such, and I bet the government would shut up.
1. Obese children are often those that live in urban areas, born to poor parents without adequate transportation. These are the kids that eat from convenience stores, not because their parents want to feed them nothing but crap, but because when the nearest grocery store is still too far away, what choice do they have?
2. Poor, living in an urban area, without adequate transportation usually means minority, although not so much since the economy has worsened. Overall, society still chooses to view these as minority problems. Therefore, threatening to take the children of those that cannot reach adequate nutrition, is the same as threatening to take children because their parents are poor minorities.
3. If this were addressed that way, with all of the ensuing bedlam from minority action groups and outspoken African American leaders, the government "leaders" would shut up pretty fast. They always do when someone points out that their new policy is racist, which happens quite often.

BTW, obesity is not abuse in my eyes. It can be due to neglect, but it can also be due to a diagnosed or undiagnosed medical condition, lack of education, lack of resources, lack of access, in other words, mostly due to things that the government could handle for much cheaper by providing education, training, jobs, resources, transportation, and healthier choices in urban areas...do they? No.

Just remember, the most terrifying words in the English language: "We're from the government and we're here to help."
 

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