According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 18 and under obesity is an ever-rising malignance, having doubled in children and quadrupled in adolescents within the past 30 years. Unlike adults, children are a bit harder to coach on proper eating habits, and while we cannot be there all the time to monitor their diet, Kurbo can.
Kurbo is, according to sources, the first kid safe, obesity-eliminating weapon offered to children that is completely administered over a mobile device. Using smartphone apps, virtual feedback, and live acutely targeted coaching, Kurbo is a training program teaching children the ‘ins and outs’ of weight loss as achieved through a healthier diet.
"If an adult needs to lose weight, you might try MyFitnessPal or Weight Watchers, but neither of those is safe or even permitted for users under age eighteen," states Joanna Strober, co-founder and CEO of Kurbo. "We decided to take the best of the best hospital-based programs in the country and adapt them to the digital age. Kids love their cellphones, so why not put them to work to help with this problem?"
Along with national diet knowhow, Kurbo gains most of its knowledge, as well as its beginnings, from the pediatric obesity program based in Stanford University’s Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital. Part of rock health, a seed fund for digital health startups, Kurbo takes a dieting plan whose success rate falls within a staggering 80 percent, and attempts to bring to it national attention. This proven diet plan, rather than administering a calorie counting system (which is unsafe for children), follows the ‘Traffic Light Diet’ food systemization program. Basically, this means that children are advised and encouraged to eat plenty of green foods (fruits and veggies), a moderate amount of yellow foods (whole grain breads, lean meats, dairy products), and a light amount of red foods (processed foods containing large sugar and fat quantities), a diet which Kurbo instills through the aforementioned mobile mediums.
Kurbo began beta testing in February with children across the country, ages 8-18, and since then, has yielded an 85 percent body mass index (BMI) reduction in just ten weeks.
"It's extremely rare for me to invest in any start-up, but with Kurbo there was an opportunity to help solve one of the world's biggest problems—childhood obesity—using mobile technology," stated Susan Wojcicki, CEO of YouTube and series A benefactor of Kurbo.
Along with Susan’s support and the support of many large affordable healthcare organizations, Kurbo has received funds from Signia Venture Partners, Data Collective, Bessemer Venture Partners, and Promus Ventures, in a very successful series A funding round that brought in $5.8 million.
In terms of keeping a youth’s diet on track, the mobile device has a much farther, more pervasive reach than any pediatrician could ever hope to wield, operating as an acute and personal dietitian where kids need one, whenever they need one.
Edited by
Maurice Nagle
