In our now quite evolved little series on how the Federal Government will make so many of us ‘healthy’ so that we never need to exact any measure of money from our nationalized health system, we present the latest Nanny Proposal to wend its way out into the wild. As the USA Today and others report, the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force, which makes medical-care recommendations based on the latest research, is now calling for Physicians and other medical professionals to screen children age 6 and older for obesity and refer obese kids to comprehensive weight-management programs.

Thats right, imagine this. Parent One goes to the doctor with her 7 year old son. The pediatrician ’screens’ the kid (because obesity may not always be visible you know) and deems that child to be ‘overweight’ and therefore at risk for all kinds of serious things like a  greater risk of weight-related health problems such as high cholesterol, blood pressure and diabetes, plus they have an increased chance of becoming obese adults. So, that doc informs the parent that their kid failed the screen and has to get ‘help’ for the obesity. Now lets look at Parent B. That dad takes his daughter to the doc and the doc says, ‘Hey Dad, your daughter is like 4′8″ and 150 pounds– she is huge’. Dad must be amazed– such an astute observation by a medial professional. So, the first parent needs a doctor to tell her that her kid is obese even though he looks fine and the second needs a doc to re-state the obvious. What do do, then? Well the USA Today adds some nuggets of fun here:

Parents seeking treatment for their obese child or teen need to carefully review program to make sure the professionals are trained to work with children, she says. “What works for adults doesn’t necessarily work for kids. They have developmental nutritional needs, and exercise has to be fun for them. It can’t be a boot-camp mentality.” Keith Ayoob, associate professor of pediatrics at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York, says parents have to be involved with their children in any weight-management program. “Part of the problem is that where there are obese children, there are often obese parents.”

So, what does this all mean? Well, I guess obesity is now something we need to “treat” and that treatment has to be given by “professionals” specially trained to treat obesity in kids. As doctors we just are flummoxed here. How about less food? BUT we digress– treatment, professionals, check. Then we learn that these professionals are needed because we need to keep in mind that these kids are, well, kids– and not just small adults. The ‘program’ needs to be fun for them. Check. And then we learn that, shock of all shocks, obese kids have obese parents. Lets let that one sink in. If in the end we treat away with all the kiddie professionals we can find, using fun things like exercise and play (versus couches and Xbox) and we even limit food intake to something close to daily caloric need– we got a problem Houston. Mommy and Daddy are still obese– and all that treat1in’ by those specially trained kid professionals didn’t help mom and dad. So, looks like the next logical step is that once  a kid gets screened and is found ‘obese’ , and gets to gettin’ some treatment for that obesity– looks like we gotta get some more treatment and some new specially trained adult treaters to deal with mom and dad.

Trust us on this: the parent police are not too far off. Pretty soon– you just watch, someone, will make the argument that obese parents pose a risk and danger to kids no different from homes that have guns or drugs and that kids should be removed from those homes for their own safety and well being.

TRUST US. THIS IS COMING.