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The latest on the Key Bridge collapse, New York puts forth legislation to get clean energy projects on the grid and Wisconsin and other states join a federal summer food program to help feed kids across the country.

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Republicans float conspiracy theories on the collapse of Baltimore's Key Bridge, South Carolina's congressional elections will use a map ruled unconstitutional, and the Senate schedules an impeachment trial for Homeland Secretary Mayorkas.

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Historic wildfires could create housing and health issues for rural Texans, a Kentucky program helps prison parolees start a new life, and descendants of Nicodemus, Kansas celebrate the Black settlers who journeyed across the 1870s plains seeking self-governance.

Report: Childhood Obesity Rates Declining

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Wednesday, February 6, 2013   

Childhood obesity rates are beginning to decline.

A study from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention finds fewer obese young children in Los Angeles County. The landmark study compared low-income children in the nation's two most populous regions: Los Angeles and New York City.

"The obesity rate in children ages 3 and 4 has been coming down in New York since 2003," said study co-author Shannon Whaley, director of research and evaluation for Public Health Foundation Enterprises Inc., and the Women, Infants and Children (WIC) Program. "L.A. County has now started to turn in 2008 and 2009. Now, our obesity rates are coming down, which is very encouraging."

While the report doesn't address the reasons for the turnaround, Whaley said the findings suggest that something can be done to impact the obesity epidemic in early childhood - and the earlier, the better. Focusing on early childhood is critical, she said, because it helps lay the foundation for healthy behaviors later in life.

"We're hopeful that it'll encourage researchers, policymakers, etcetera, to start exploring what has gone on in these two cities that might be impacting these declines in obesity rates," she said.

Children in the study were enrolled in the WIC Special Supplemental Nutrition Program. More than two-thirds of all infants born in Los Angeles County and more than half of all preschool-aged children in the county are served by WIC.

First 5 LA provided funding for the Los Angeles County analysis. More information on the study is online at cdc.gov.


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