Weight is becoming a health issue for more and more Americans across the country of all ages and genders. In fact, some doctors estimate that eight out of ten adults over the age of twenty-five are overweight. With children, the health trends are even scarier with the number of obese children tripling while obese adult only double. That's why the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has published BMI numbers for children as well as adults.

BMI stands for body mass index. Doctors use this number to evaluate whether their patients are maintaining a healthy body weight. To compute your own BMI, simply divide your weight twice by your height (in inches) and multiple that number by 703. If the number you get is less than 18.5 you're underweight, 18.5-24.9 is normal, 25-29.9 is overweight and 30 and above is qualified as obese.

After conducting this simple test, most people can decide whether or not body weight is an issue in their life. If it is, the next step is to lose those extra pounds in a safe and effective process. Like weight gain, natural weight loss is usually a gradual and time-consuming process. For optimal results, you should only aim for a one or two pound decrease each week. The healthiest ways to lower your weight is to decrease the number of calories going in and increasing the amount of energy going out by down-sizing portion sizes and participating in moderate physical activity.

Unfortunately, a lot of people would rather speed up the weight-loss process by starving themselves or using over-the-counter diet pills than exercising and dieting. There are two problems that arise when people use these methods though. First of all, when you don't eat enough food to meet your body's needs, it can shift into starvation mode. The metabolism slows down and your body hangs on to fat for a longer period of time. Consequently, it becomes even harder than before to lose weight.

The second problem is that many diet pills are dangerous. Some diet pills do contain healthful ingredients but, as largely unregulated products, many of them also contain harmful ingredients. If you choose the wrong diet pills, the side effects could include anything from heart palpitations and heart attacks to drug dependence, anxiety, high blood pressure and unhealthy metabolic changes.

Some kids start using diet pills as early as age twelve and, in an effort to speed up the results, some of those teenagers take more than the recommended doses. This increases their chances of suffering negative health effects from diet pills. In exchange for a short-term dramatic result, they compromise their physical well-being in the long-term. That is why parents in particular need to be aware of which diet pills are dangerous and how their children are using them.