"Too little milk, sunshine and exercise: It’s an anti-bone trifecta. And for some kids, shockingly, it’s leading to rickets, the soft-bone scourge of the 19th century.“ This is the first image of a waking nightmare, a dark dream of physical malady that many of us thought rested safely in the past. Rickets is a deficiency where bones become so soft that legs literally bow out. "Rickets was once thought to have been eradicated with milk fortification, but it is making a resurgence.“ The return of the nightmare of rickets marring children’s bodies is announced in Lauran Neergaard’s article, "Kids‘ Bones Spur Concern: Doctors see rickets cases rise as skeletal development lags“ (The Denver Post, 27 Nov 07).
The easily visible dragon of rickets was thought to have been slayed in the First World. However, the dragon was only asleep. Not only has it returned, the dragon is now shape-shifting, too. "Cases of full-blown rickets are just the red flag: Bone specialists say possibly millions of seemingly healthy children aren’t building as much strong bone as they should – a gap that may leave them more vulnerable to bone-cracking osteoporosis later in life than their grandparents are.“ But it turns out that there is a more subtle bone disease dragon that we are only now becoming aware of.
It is being discovered that something not readily visible has deleterious effects much later on. "Almost half of peak bone mass develops during adolescence, and the concern is that missing out on the strongest possible bones in childhoold could haunt people decades later. By the 30s, bone is broken down faster than it’s rebuilt. Then it’s a race to maintain bone and avoid the thin bones of osteoporosis in old age.“ The future impact of adolescent bone mass loss is startling. "‘There’s some early data showing that even a 10 percent deficit in your bone mass when you finish your adolescent years can increase your potential risk of having osteporosis and fractures as much as 50 percent, says Dr. James Beaty, president of the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons."
Facts demonstrate that this newly-configured dragon is subtly making its all-too-real presence known. "Already there’s evidence that U.S. children break their arms more often today than four decades ago – girls 56 percent more, and boys 32 percent more, according to a Mayo clinic study.“ Today’s children’s bones, even when not bent from rickets are, it seems, more fragile than in the past.
Just as we know what is causing this disturbing trend, we know how to fight the new shapes of the bone-loss dragon. "Strong bones require more than calcium alone. Exercise is at least as important. Consider: The dominant arm of a tennis player has 35 percent more bone than the non-dominant arm.“ We come face to face with another physical health dragon that is wreaking havoc across the American landscape: lack of exercise. Strong bones require exercise. That’s clear enough, yet "childhood exercise is dropping as obesity rises.“
The dragon sprouts yet another head. "The body can’t absorb calcium and harden bones without vitamin D. By some estimates, 30 percent of teens get too little. It’s not just that they don’t drink fortified milk. Bodies make vitamin D with sunlight. With teen computer use, urban youngsters without safe places to play outdoors and less school P.E., it’s no wonder D levels are low. Because skin pigment alters sun absorption, black children are particularly at risk.“
Several unhealthy patterns of our contemporary American lifestyle are converging to result in bone loss problems. In confronting the reawakened nightmare-dragon of rickets, the negative ramifications of bone loss for children and adults, we who live the American Dream must confront various other dragons, too. We must look at the shadow aspect of our junk-food, couch-potato lifestyles. Our increased disconnection from our bodies and patterns that encourage physical health has very real, very negative results. We need to wake up from our junk-life coma and re-evaluate our dreams, our goals, our ideals. Lives of junk-food ease and junk-food sloth are turning into bleak nightmares manifest in our waking-life bodies. The nightmare is shouting at us to wake up and make changes.
Do we want rickets and osteoporosis to be part of the American Dream?
