What should blood pressure be in healthy children?

In a recent commentary,1 Adams and Landaw propose the novel concept that normally growing children need not have an associated progressive increase in blood pressure (BP). Noting that the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute Task Force graphs to be used for plotting of pressure during growth and maturation show a continual increase of BP levels with age, they state that "Any implication that this is a healthy phenomenon associated with the aging process . . . is unjustified."2 To support this concept they cite data from studies in unacculturated tribes (ie, the Yanomamo Indians) showing that mean BP levels of these indians aged 0 to 50+, except for a slight increase from ages 0 to 9 years to 10 to 19 years, show no increase with age; this pattern is unlike that found in the United States and other Western cultures.