ARKANSAS, USA — The percentage of Arkansas students classified as obese rose more than 3% during the COVID-impacted 2020-21 school year, a much larger jump than the three preceding years combined.
A new report on childhood obesity by the Arkansas Center for Health Improvement found that 26% of the state’s public school students in all grades had a body mass index measurement of 30 or greater in 2020-21, classifying them as obese.
That was the largest percentage since data collection began in 2003, and it represented a 3.1% increase from the previous school year when the percentage was 22.9%. The percentage had increased from 22% to 22.9% the previous three years.
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