Healthier teens for a better future

During our teenage years, many imporant changes in our bodies happen. It’s a period of intense
growth and development, which is why it is especially important to maintain a healthy lifestyle in
those years.
Unfortunately, these days many teens don’t take very good care of their health. A lot of them spend
their days looking at screens, the only “excercise” in their day being crossing the distance between
their computer and bed. It sounds ridiculous, but it’s the sad reality.
Eating a balanced diet, doing sport and staying away from drugs, including alcohol and nicotine is
crucial to proper development during puberty. The American Heart Association recently stated that
no amount of ethanol is safe for consumption, even for adults, meaning that even small amounts
could have health implications.
Many stimulants, including, but not limited to those formerly stated, lead to health problems, such
as liver failure, improper brain development and various types of cancer. This is why it’s important
to curb their use.
A way to reduce substance use among teenagers is to promote healthy ways of coping with stress:
engaging in physical activity, building good relationships with their peers and going outside to see
the nature.
When it comes to promoting good dietary choices among the youth, educational campaigns at
schools can be highly effective, especially when combined with good quality, healthy school
lunches. Canteens are places in which students can be taught that healthy doesn’t need to mean
bland, boring and unpalatable.
Ultimately, many of these decisions are in hands of our politicians, which is why we should put
pressure on them to make the needed changes. On top of that, such measures would act as a proac-
tive approach, decreasing the number of possible future diseases in the populaton, which would
greatly help our healthcare system.