With childhood obesity on the rise, should parents worry about
the weight of their babies? Experts at the American Academy of
Pediatrics (AAP) say parents should ask their pediatricians to
keep tabs on children's weight from birth on up. But they
shouldn't obsess about the weight of a child younger than 2
years. Members of the AAP Nutrition Committee say there are no
data to support the belief that children in this age group who
are overweight are more prone to be heavy later. No BMI for
infants For kids this young, doctors don't rely on the body mass
index, which relates weight to height. Instead, pediatricians
use weight-for-length charts. According to the AAP, height is
difficult to measure in infants and very young children, and
length and height are not the same as in older kids. Instead,
the best predictors of an overweight child are first, whether
both parents are overweight, and second, whether the mother
alone is overweight. If parents weigh too much and feed the
child a poor diet, chances of an over