Which Kids are Healthier? Orphan Kids with AIDS in Africa or USA Kids Eating School Lunch and Their Share of Fast Food?

 
You Decide.   

A READERS’ POLL

A scary thought flitted though my mind while my friend was showing me her pictures of kids living with AIDS in the ghetto orphanage for AIDS victims in South Africa (SA).

My friend volunteers at the orphanage and has taken lots of pictures of the kids.

I was caught off guard when a sincere and alarming question began gnawing at me.

Who is Healthier?

• SA (South Africa) Kids living with AIDS in an orphanage located deep in the ghetto or

• USA kids mostly not living with HIV who eat school lunches and their share of fast food?

My friend who volunteers at the orphanage for victims of AIDS told me she was “totally humbled” when she thought she had a good donation idea for the orphanage. She is a dynamic French cuisine cook. She makes everything healthy and from scratch for her family of 7 elite ski racers.

As my friend sat rocking a baby desperate for human touch in the orphanage, she mused out loud to the understaffed caregiver employees:

“The kids should have more vegetables”.

She continued by thinking out loud:

“A donation of a Cuisinart food processor would really be nice for the orphanage to help reduce work in the kitchen.  My Cuisinart saves me lots of time in cooking and entertaining.”

The 2 women caring for 18 children, 6 of whom were under 2 years old and still in diapers, turned and looked at my friend in WONDER:

“We don’t have any vegetables.”

“Most of these children have never tasted a bite of real food.”

The 2 women are each paid only the equivalent of $2 USA per day.

“We don’t have money for food.”

The orphans are fed a sorghum based meal replacement product for every meal.

The sign language symbol the boy is making is “I love you.”

“We would not be able to use the Cuisinart. We do not have money for vegetables in our homes either.”

“Would you like to know what I will be eating tonight at my house?

Nothing; we have no food at home for tonight. We will eat the same sorghum based meal replacement that the children eat here.”

The orphans living with HIV are fed the same natural non-GMO sorghum based product mixed with water 3 times a day. The meal replacement product is not genetic engineered or modified (non-GE / non-GMO).

Do these pictures affect you the same way they did me?

You and I actually have a scientific right to participate in this Nutrition Status POLL as well as the right to ask this nutrition question:  Who is healthier SA ghetto orphans or USA kids?

Looking at a child is now a medically accurate way to tell if children have diabetes and also to tell the status of kids’ nutrition health — a major determiner of immune system health.  These are 2 key health issues in USA kids and in Africa kids.

For over 20 years now medical literature has been confirming that a quick visual look at a person is as accurate as loads of lab tests in determining a kid’s nutritional health. There is even a medical term for visual nutrition assessment: SUBJECTIVE GLOBAL ASSESSMENT or SGA.

WHY IS KID’S NUTRITION STATUS SO IMPORTANT?

Nutrition status is a major determinate in:

• immune system health,
• ability to fight AIDS,
• prevention of infections,
• and overall health.

Your visual SGA (Subjective Global Assessment) eyes are better than mine.

Your SGA nutrition intuition counts.

Nutritional health is a key determinate of:

1. Medical Outcomes

2. Quality of Life

3. How Long We Live

After viewing hundreds of pictures of kids in the orphanage I began to realize I wasn’t seeing overweight kids, skinny kids, or kids with pot bellies and thin arms and legs.

Most of the kids were active. There were only 2 sick children with runny noses and one child just back from the ER whose picture is included later in this blog.

Inexpensive sorghum meal replacement.

Refer to Chapter 3 section 3.4.4, 3.5.5 and 3.6. in the malnutrition study PDF in the link.

Note:  The author has no financial interest or connection with any of the food products, books, medications, orphanage, or other topics discussed in this readers’ poll article.The author does not have a financial interest or connection with any of the other books, sources, and products mentioned in the book WHAT ELITE ATHLETES EAT.  The author writes about athlete nutrition and wellness.

If you need to see more pictures of the kids in South Africa (SA) with HIV before you vote in the POLL, below is a YouTube link to check out more pictures of the kids.  The YouTube photos are unabbridged  and all the kids in the orphange are in the pictures.  The files off of my friend’s camera were not edited; she took pictures of the sick children and the well children.  Here is the YouTube link to all the pictures of the orphans http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QFDEbO-dAK8 or search YouTube for My Trip to the Ghetto AIDS Orphanage in South Africa.  Later in this blog there are pictures of sick children also.

You be the judge of the children’s health status in the AIDS orphanage versus America. The POLL is a little farther along in the blog.

American kids eat plenty of truly healthy food intermixed with food containing trans fats, genetic modified food, high carb food, and restaurant food.

We all know how starvation and malnutrition look. Science confirms what we innately know.

• Belly bigger than hips is now considered almost diagnostic of childhood type 2 diabetes and pre-diabetes.  USA kids 3 years old are now being diagnosed with type 2 diabetes.  This child likely has type 2 diabetes or pre-diabetes.  Diabetes can shorten lifespan as much as HIV.

• A pot belly and spindly little arms and legs mean not enough protein and too many carbs.

• Low protein means low immune function.

• Black sunken eyes

are associated with malnutrition.

37%

37%

37%

37% of children attending public schools in Salt Lake City, Utah where both school lunches and breakfasts that meet required federal USDA guidelines are served are diagnosed with either type 2 diabetes (17%) or pre-diabetes (20%).

Carbo loading diets have pushed the USA young to now experience a disease that used to affect those 50 years old and older. Having the diagnosis of pre-diabetes is a serious disease; it means organ damage of diabetes has begun already for the child.  USA kids have staggering levels of diabetes.

Restaurants and school cafeterias serve about the same fare. In fact most schools now serve fast food from McDonald’s, Burger King and pizza vendors. Eating out at a more expensive restaurant???—the food mix (carb/protein/fat) is about the same – high carb — only the price is different.

The other name for this epidemic is

“the fattening of America”.

Now let’s see what American kids eat.

USA Kids’ top 10 sources of CARBS:

1. Bread
2. Soft drinks
3. Milk
4. Cold cereals
5. Cakes/cookies
6. Donuts
7. Sugars / syrups / jams
8. Fruit drinks
9. Pasta               10. White potatoes

ALL ARE HIGH SUGAR IMPACT CARB FOODS. Notice that neither fresh fruit or vegetables made the top 10 list for US kids’ carbs.

All 10 top carbs USA kids eat are “empty calorie foods”.  USA Kids’ carbs are empty of nutrition and full of calories. All 10 USA kids carbs are low in nutrition value.

USA kids’ top PROTEIN sources:

1. Chicken

2. Ready-to-eat cereal

3. Pasta

NONE of these protein sources ARE TOP QUALITY.

Cereals are laced with GMO corn (genetic modified corn) and chickens are often fed GMO corn. Pasta and cereal are mainly high sugar impact foods, not good PROTEIN sources.  The breakfast may be “low fat”, but it is full of high sugar impact carbs that cause the body to convert the excess carbs in the meal into fats in the body.

USA kids’ top FAT sources:

1. Potato chips

2. Corn chips

3. Popcorn

FREQUENTLY CONTAIN MAN ALTERED FATS

TRANS FATS, AND GENETIC MODIFIED FOOD

Malnutrition

can cause

depression.

Does eating over 50% of calories at school like American kids and having plenty of money to eat out buy good nutritional status and physical fitness? Is living in one of the richest countries in the free world healthier?

Carbonated beverages with high fructose corn syrup are high sugar impact drinks. The corn used to make the high fructose corn syrup is usually GMO (genetic modified) corn.

10 to 20% of all new pediatric patients at Columbia University Medical Center are now being diagnosed with “adult” onset type 2 diabetes.

“Today’s kids are the first generation of Americans predicted to live less years than their parents.”

When kids are overweight / obese, after these kids grow up and quit eating school food, studies show that even if they lose weight as adults they still die 10 years younger on average than kids who are not overweight as children.

We can solve this problem ourselves and protect our children and families. Here is a link you may choose to come back to after you vote in the POLL.

It is hard for me to answer this poll.

Your nutrition intuition counts.

We need your vote.

First Visual SGA (Subjective Global Assessment) POLL:

JASON

In South Africa the orphans are housed 18 children to a house.

The sickest of the 18 kids in the home my friend visited was Jason, just back from the ER.

Jason had his pretty serious Staph skin infection wound dressed and he received medicine to treat his tuberculosis (TB). He received antibiotics to add to all his AIDS medications.

Antibiotic for Staph infection and TB medication

Topical Therapies: Zinc and Castor Bean Oil.

Folic acid vitamin and another ER medication

Jason’s AIDS medications

Silvadene Cream (not shown) was also prescribed for the wound. Silvadene cream contains silver and is used to prevent infections for people in burn treatment hospitals.

To the left are some of Jason’s regular AIDS medications.

Jason’s POLL (Visual Subjective Global Assesment SGA):

More of Jason’s Medications

Which kids are more active SA or USA?

(SA = South Africa Orphans and USA = United States)

SA Kids with Almost No Toys, a Concrete Playground Protected by Barbed Wire, Scant Books, and Minimal Mental Stimulation.

The orphans stay in the small playground to play and do not go out in the neighborhood to play because of significant physical dangers.

Check out the boys’ muscle tone and stomach sizes. Also zoom in on the handmade dump truck pull toy fashioned from fence wire. The boys are deciding to give one of their precious trucks to the kids outside the fence who have less than them.

Kids living in the neighborhood receiving their gift truck from the orphan boys. There were only 2 wheels available to make the truck.

USA: Plenty of Toys, Sports and Entertainment

SGA (Visual Subjective Global Assessment) POLL 3:

At this writing, whenever possible, the orphans who are victims of HIV are being moved from the orphanage houses into foster homes where they can become members of families. They then continue to be supported with medical help and finances by the same organization, but in their new foster homes.

THE GHETTO NEIGHBORHOOD AROUND THE ORPHANAGE

Many people in the neighborhood are hungry. The SA and USA Cares for Life orphanage has a back window in the kitchen and anyone in the neighborhood who needs a meal can come to the window for a natural non-GMO sorghum based — organic vegan meal replacement — free meal.

Children and adults in the surrounding neighborhood experience high carb malnutrition resulting in pot bellies and thin arms and legs.

THE NEIGHBORHOOD SURROUNDING THE ORPHANAGE

5 homes share each toilet and the house numbers assigned to each outhouse are written on the toilet door.

There is a water spigot by each bank of toilets where women wash clothes.

Gratefully, the orphanage has indoor plumbing…

Against all odds the orphanage is an island of hope in a vast sea of hunger, AIDS, poverty, and malnutrition.

The orphanage runs on a tight budget with scant money for food, 2 employees per shift who live in the neighboring ghetto, a van to transport kids to medical care, donated clothes…

…And a washing machine (no dryer).

Thanks so so so much for your nutrition intuition votes in the polls and for watching!

Note:  The author has no financial interest or connection with any of the food products, books, medications, orphanage, or other topics discussed in this article.

What can we do now to protect our kids in school?

For individual solutions and answers groups of parents have created to protect kids health in the school lunchroom see Chapter 8 Should I Let My Kids Eat the School Lunch? In the following book WHAT ELITE ATHLETES EAT written by the author of this article.  WhatEliteAthletesEat.com

There is less money spent for nutrition for these orphans with AIDS than is spent on kids in refugee camps in Chad where they spent 1.23 Francs per week to feed a family of 6 rice and beans. This link takes you to a world famous photographer, Peter Menzel, who documented what families around the world spend for their food for 1 week via his award winning photos in his book Hungry Planet.