The Fit Village is the original inspiration for the Fit Community. This greater vision led the way for implementation of our current programs with urban youth in Los Angeles. In 2000, when the Fit Village was proposed, few had yet acknowledged the urgency required to address the growing obesity epidemic in the United States. This proposal serves to address that very problem, and to inspire communities to create change from within.

 

The Need for Fit Village in the Modern Nation

Former President Clinton

Statistics

Mission Statement

The Goal

Programs: Forward Description

Intended Effects

Possible Unintended Affects

Implementation

Financing

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We are the fattest nation in the world; about one half of adults, and approximately 11 percent of youths (6-17 years old) in the US are considered to be overweight. The issue is not about physical appearance: being significantly overweight, especially to the point of obesity, is a serious health risk that leads to heart disease, osteoporosis, cancer and diabetes. According to former US Surgeon General Dr. C. Everett Koop, "Except for smoking, obesity is now the number one preventable cause of death in this country. Three hundred thousand people die of obesity every year."

Fit4Free hopes to address this problem by encouraging the nation to stop gaining weight. If we persist with the current trend of weight gain in our country, we will all be affected personally, economically, and socially. The problem is not necessarily the weight gain itself; obesity and weight gain are merely symptoms of an unhealthy nation that does not get enough activity and relies too much on a convenience based diet, including high calorie, high fat, and highly processed foods.

The theory of Fit Village is to adapt the modern society to itself. The drastic changes in our culture over the last fifty years have left us with a very fast-paced way of life, so that much of our lifestyle is now based on convenience. Unfortunately, our society has not figured out a convenient way of staying healthy. Even after successfully demanding social change in the area of human rights, we in the US have not been able to create effective public policy in regard to diet and fitness.

Fit4Free's mission is to help reconcile the way lifestyles are today, with the way they ought to be to match our fast-paced convenient world. This involves proper nutrition, regular exercise, and screening in medicine. In order to do this, we need to change the environment to be fitness compatible so that it's easier for people to be more responsible and take charge of their health.

Fit4Free is offering its programs as a form of preventive medicine. The progress we have made in the field of medical research in the past fifty years is astonishing. We now know what types of lifestyles contribute to death and disease. However, these discoveries mean nothing if we the people do not put them to use. Fit4Free is directed at "retro-fitness". The idea is to educate our society to become politically correct in regard to fitness and nutrition.

The project will implement programs which are all natural, and which will focus on the importance of physical fitness as a way to prevent future health problems, rather than aiming for fitness for the sake of vanity. We are continuing to lead lives that set a poor example for our children. Would it be socially moral to allow our children to smoke at the age of 3 when we know that smoking causes potentially fatal diseases? Of course not; but why, then, do we feed our children unhealthy foods at the age of 3, teaching them bad eating habits that contribute to the four leading causes of death in the US?

"Providing citizens with accurate information that affects their lives is one of government's most vital responsibilities. But citizens have a responsibility to use that information wisely as well, especially when it comes to the food they provide their children, and the habits they encourage in them." -Former President Clinton

The National Institutes of Health (NHI) identify overweight as a BMI of 25-29.9 kg/m squared, and obesity as a BMI of 30 kg/m squared or greater. However, the terms overweight and obese are not mutually exclusive, since obese persons are also overweight. The problems of overweight and obesity are found worldwide, and the prevalence of these conditions in the United States ranks high along with other developed nations. From 1991 to 1998, obesity increased in every state of the United States, in both genders, and across all races/ethnicity’s, age groups, educational levels, and smoking stases.

• More than half of US adults are overweight.
  
• Nearly one-quarter of US adults are obese.
  
• More than 60 percent of adults do not achieve the recommended amount of regular physical activity. About 25 percent of adults are not active at all.
• The fiscal cost to the US, of the overweight and obesity problem, is $99.2 billion.
• Americans spend $33 billion annually on weight-loss products and services, including diet foods, products and programs.
• Approximately 300,000 deaths in the United States, each year, are attributable to poor diet and inactivity.
• Nearly 70 percent of cardiovascular disease cases are related to obesity.

Youth Statistics

• The percentage of young people who are overweight has doubled since 1980.
• Of children aged 5 to 15 who are overweight, 61% have one or more cardiovascular disease risk factors, and 27% have two or more.
• Fitness tests administered throughout California in 1999 found that only about one in five students in the fifth, seventh, and ninth grades met the standards for all health-related fitness components and that more than 40% did not meet the minimum fitness standard for cardio respiratory endurance.

  According to a Report to the President, from the Secretary of Health and Human Services and the Secretary of Education:

  "Our nation's young people are, in large measure, inactive, unfit, and increasingly overweight. In the long run, this physical inactivity threatens to reverse the decades-long progress we have made in reducing death from cardiovascular diseases and to devastate our national health care budget. In the short run, physical inactivity has contributed to an unprecedented epidemic of childhood obesity that is currently plaguing the United States."

Can we change the Future?

Fit4Free hopes that we can help change the future of health care. Today's health care system is expanding every year and spending billions of dollars to keep the US healthy, but it doesn't sufficiently address the need for prevention. Doctors can treat illnesses such as heart disease, but it is also important to educate patients about how to prevent such problems before they arise. If our communities offered programs that focused on such preventative strategies, there would be fewer illnesses to deal with and fewer health care costs as well. As it stands today, our system provides no resources to help unhealthy people change their lifestyles; and we are not putting forth any effort to encourage the economically disadvantaged citizens of our country to lead healthier lives.

If we keep this up, we can also count on soaring healthcare costs in the future, that our healthcare budget may not be able to accommodate. Fit4Free intends to change the fitness and nutrition paradigm for all generations before we are left with a healthcare crisis and no solutions. We believe that through preventative health, we can offer an effective and reasonable solution. The economic benefits of Fit4Free will be great, but they could not possibly outweigh the sociological benefits that a program of this nature could provide

We are a non-profit organization trying to raise the contemporary lifestyle of Americans to match the modern world they are living in.

In today's modern society, many people do not know how to properly take care of their own bodies. This is made evident by the obesity epidemic in the US, and by the amount of deaths that are caused each year by poor diet and inactivity. The problem is that over the past few decades our lifestyles have not adjusted to the modern way of life. The American diet and daily level of activity is vastly different now from the way it was 20 years ago, but we have not made any changes in our lifestyle to account for this discrepancy. For example, walking and bicycling by children aged 5-15 dropped 40% between 1977 and 1995.

Meanwhile, fast food chains have appeared in many public schools within the last 10 years, providing children with high-fat processed foods for lunch. To address these changes, have schools increased health education efforts and physical activity requirements? Unfortunately, no; and, in fact, attendance in physical education classes is on the decline. Fit4Free wants to help people adapt their health practices to this new era of convenience and technology. There have to be tradeoffs; if we drive to work now instead of walking, then we have to spend more time walking after work. It's as simple as that, but people need to be informed and supported in order to create change.

Now that we know as much as we do in the field of medicine, it is difficult to ignore the cause and therefore the prevention of most diseases. Unfortunately, many people are misinformed or poorly educated, and as a result of this, the health of the nation is deteriorating. In the past, there was no knowledge of how to prevent cancer. Health was not as clearly linked to preventative medicine as it is today, because we have had incredible advancements in medical research over the past twenty years. These advancements should be translating into a healthier way of life for our society, but without putting them into practice, they are of no use.

That is our mission- we want to put these advancements to practical use by incorporating the principles of preventative medicine into our modern way of life. We know the causes of our major health problems; people are not getting enough physical activity, and they are eating too much of the wrong kinds of foods. If we want people to exercise, we need to make access to exercise equipment free for everyone and offer community activities like walking, biking or some other cardiovascular activity. If we want people to eat a healthier diet, we have to provide them with information about nutrition, teach them how to cook healthy meals, and offer healthier lunch options in the workplace and in schools. These programs have to be integrated into daily life, so that people don't have to go too far out of their way to choose a fitness- compatible option. After all, we are competing with the super-convenient fast food companies for people's health, so we must put forth an equal effort.

The Fit Village would be the pilot project for Fit4Free. Our goal is to try, within a village setting, to provide access to information about health and fitness directly to the people in the community. We want to implement a mini-society in which some of the boundaries are controllable, and are geared toward a healthy way of life. We will then monitor the results within the chosen community to see the effects on the people's health and lifestyles. We hope to learn from the results which strategies are effective so that, ultimately, Fit Village could serve as the model for a program that could be implemented on a nationwide scale.

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Fit4Free wants to demonstrate the effectiveness of a fitness-compatible society by implementing programs designed to educate the community about health and fitness, and provide a diverse array of preventative health strategies for people to choose from.

(Note) The programs offered will not disturb or interfere with local businesses or existing services. The programs will be educational and optional; we will not enforce or make mandatory any of the programs used. We do not want to hurt any businesses or institutions; we do want to reconcile the way things are with the way things ought to be, in accordance with our modern society, economy, and health care system.

The following are some general examples, but the final programs will be tailored to fit the characteristics and demographics of the actual Fit Village community.

1. Stop Gaining Weight: The idea is not to lose weight, but to stop gaining it. Villagers will be taught how not to gain weight and how to take control of their health.

2. Free Public Gym: Fit4Free will provide a free gym open to residents of the community (like a library, but funded by our program).

3. Politically Correct Fitness Community: People in the community will be encouraged to get out, walk around, and be a part of community life.

4. Parks with Recreation: The parks will be supplied with fitness equipment to support the classes and activities that will be provided for the community.

5. Quality Fit Time: This program will create opportunities for parents and children to benefit from community implemented classes in various fitness arenas. This will encourage interaction between parent and child in the community parks system.

6. Retro-Fit Restaurants:

(a) A nutritionist would help restaurants translate their menus into nutritional value listings (like kcal, protein, fat, carbohydrates).

According to former President Clinton: "For over six years, the government has required nutrition labeling on most foods. With better information, Americans are making better choices. We're eating less fat as a percentage of our diet; more fruits, vegetables and whole grains; and average blood cholesterol levels are going down."

With better information from more resources in the community, we hope that the results will be incredibly beneficial to overall health.

(b) A nutritionist would recommend that restaurants offer three varied meal sizes (small portion, medium portion, and large portion). This would allow individuals to eat according to their size and metabolic needs.

7. Teach the Teachers: Teachers will be thoroughly informed about proper health and fitness so they may pass on this vital information to their students.

8. Teach the Students: All grades will be provided with in-class education, as well as practical hands-on education about nutrition and fitness.

(a) Older students will be taught how to cook healthy meals for themselves.
(b) Children will be taught how to shop for their families, and themselves, in order to create balanced and nutritious meals.
(c) Children will be instructed to use equipment provided by Fit4Free; and they will be encouraged to participate in various fitness activities.
(d) Children will be provided with healthy options for school lunches on campus. These foods will be fresh and the meals will be well balanced.

9. Fit @ Work: Fit4Free will create a team of nutrition and fitness specialists who will be available to businesses free of cost, in order to encourage a fitness-compatible workplace. This will create a working environment where fitness and nutrition are encouraged and accessible, but not mandatory. We hope that this program will discourage workers from bringing unhealthy foods (such as the ever-popular box of donuts) to work, because they will be more focused on supporting a healthy workplace environment.

10. Local Businesses: Local businesses will be encouraged to create an atmosphere for community browsing by changing displays and remaining open during crucial walking hours (after 5 PM).

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• Citizens will make more informed health-oriented decisions based on the education provided.
• Obesity will drop in overall population, helping to prevent the four deadliest diseases in the United States: Heart Disease, Stroke, Cancer, and Diabetes.
• Through education and awareness, citizens will be more conscious of the potentially fatal effects of poor diet and physical inactivity.
• The community will be brought closer together through community-oriented fitness programs and an increase in outdoor activities, such as walking.

• Citizens will have reduced stress levels, preventing future health problems and making them more effective in the workplace.
• Citizens will be more alert, as proper fitness and diet regulate sleep patterns.
• Employees will perform better at work because they will be feeling better.
• There will be a decrease in petty crime, as a result of more community activities, and more after-school programs.
• Students will be able to provide assistance to working parents by shopping for themselves and their families.
• Older students will be able to cook for themselves, taking some strain off of the working parents.
• Violent crime rates will go down because young males in the community (the most common type of violent crime offenders) will have released aggression through physical activity.
• Fewer individuals will be apt to use drugs and drink because they will be educated about fitness and nutrition. Students will especially be less apt to use drugs when they are involved in fitness and nutrition programs at school.
• Citizens will become more responsible for their health and the consequences of their lifestyle through education..
• Consumers will seek social responsibility from corporations and companies that provide goods to the community.
• People will be healthier and therefore happier altogether.

• A team of nutrition and fitness experts will be used to educate and implement programs.
• A team of sociologists will record the progress, and statistical results of Fit Village, including criminal record variations, student attention span variations, employee performance variations, etc.…
• A Medical team will help compile the medical histories of the community, and track the medical data as the project progresses..
• A statistician will record and analyze the statistical data to test the effectiveness of the Fit Village project..
• An economist will record data concerning the economical effects on the city..
• A public policy specialist will advise all members of the project and community about possible changes and additions to the program as it unfolds.

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