Although soft drink machines may be disappearing from our public schools, that's no reason to quit keeping tabs on your teen's health and waistline. Researchers from Penn State University have found another subtle contributor to the epidemic of childhood obesity plaguing America: Mid-morning lunch periods.

Based on a survey of more than 200 Pennsylvania high schools, about a fourth of them scheduled lunch periods at or before 10:30 a.m. Although individual diets weren't closely scrutinized, researchers discovered high schools with earlier lunch periods also had higher single-food sales than others with later lunch schedules. The most popular foods sold at schools with earlier lunch periods read like a recipe for obesity to me: Pizza, cookies, hamburgers and pastries.

Folks, if we fail to reverse the childhood obesity epidemic, we may witness children living shorter, health-plagued lives than their parents, a heartbreaking consequence if there ever was one. I'm convinced, however, we can overcome this epidemic before it's too late. Turning your teen's health around begins with taking important steps:

• Getting them moving on an exercise program.
• Retooling their diets based on their individual nutritional type.
• Addressing the emotions that contributed to their poor health by helping them learn an effective energy psychology tool like the Emotional Freedom Technique.

Yahoo News February 16, 2006