Childhood Obesity May Be Primary Risk Factor for Adult Cardiovascular Disease

Metabolic Syndrome is a group of health risk factors that are associated with cardiovascular disease and diabetes.  Factors include enlarged waist circumference, high blood pressure, elevated triglycerides, low HDL (“good”) cholesterol, and high fasting glucose levels. The condition is being increasingly diagnosed in children during the current global epidemic of overweight.  Nelly Mauras, from Nemours Children’s Clinic (Florida, USA), and colleagues enrolled  115 obese children (BMI above the 95th percentile for sex, age, and height), ages 7 to 18 years, and 87 normal-weight children (to serve as controls).  The children and adolescents had normal fasting blood sugar levels, normal blood pressure and normal cholesterol and triglycerides. All study participants underwent blood testing for known markers for predicting the development of cardiovascular disease, including elevated levels of C-reactive protein (CRP) -- a marker of inflammation, and abnormally high fibrinogen -- a clotting factor, among others. The researchers found that obese children had a 10 fold higher CRP and significantly higher fibrinogen concentrations, as compared to the control group. Importantly, the team observed that these abnormalities occurred in obese children as young as age 7.  They urge that: “Childhood obesity per se is associated with a proinflammatory and prothrombotic state before other comorbidities of the [metabolic syndrome] are present and even before the onset of puberty.”