The current epidemic of childhood obesity and its implications for future coronary heart disease.

This article acquaints readers with the data sources documenting the dramatic increases of overweight and obesity in the United States in the past 40 years, explains the reference standards for ascertaining measures of overweight in adults and children, and cites evidence that establishes obesity as a risk factor for premature death. Also reviewed are reports documenting recent increases in the frequency of type 2 diabetes mellitus and glucose intolerance and selected reports emanating from four longitudinal studies performed in large populations of adults, children, and adolescents linking excessive adiposity to coronary heart disease risk factors. A brief discussion of the challenges that pediatricians and other primary care health providers face in helping to diminish the prevalence of obesity and its attendant health problems is presented.