Is being "overweight" not bad after all?

Bobby__Clerici

Another excuse study to rationalize being fat.
And I'd gladly sacrifice a few years of life in exchange for quality of life - not that I am buying this.
If you want to be fat, just be fat.
No need to make it a health virtue.

CorvusCorax77

"I found it a very interesting read. I think it confirms that BMI does not by itself give an appropriate measure of a person’s health."


This is news?????

CorvusCorax77

BMI says NOTHING OF FAT.

I SMH at how ignorant this whole discussion is (the article).

etoiles_argentees

This is the first time I've seen Willett say something useful.

CorvusCorax77

I am overweight and I work hard to not be. I can tell you that I am in better shape than a lot of my friends that are skinny. I can run 3 miles and they can't do half. I bust my *kitten* on Jillian Michaels push ups and they can't do 2. I am "healthier" than they are by what I eat and do. Even if my BMI is higher than theirs.

This is why we use the phrase "skinny fat"... You probably have a lower BF% and higher LBM then your friends. Probably healthier heart and veins, too.

Bottom line: BMI is a waste of time.

skinnyinnotime

I think it's rubbish....how many old overweight people do you see?

EstiloPanama

Some people can be overweight but healthy. and BMI usually doesn't take into account muscle mass in relation to fat ratio, or where the fat is mostly stored. Individuals with more fat around their belly (apple shaped) have more issues health wise than those who are pear shaped since there is more fat around the liver. In the end, being obese is unhealthy, but being overweight can be healthy. The height/weight rations are really just guidelines based on a large pool of people used to get those numbers by scientists, researchers, clinical studies. I can believe you can be 'overweight' and healthy.

jenilla1

Another excuse study to rationalize being fat.
And I'd gladly sacrifice a few years of life in exchange for quality of life - not that I am buying this.
If you want to be fat, just be fat.
No need to make it a health virtue.

:drinker:

valmb2

I am overweight and I work hard to not be. I can tell you that I am in better shape than a lot of my friends that are skinny. I can run 3 miles and they can't do half. I bust my *kitten* on Jillian Michaels push ups and they can't do 2. I am "healthier" than they are by what I eat and do. Even if my BMI is higher than theirs.

AWESOME!!

Ely82010

Here is a link to the JAMA article on the study: http://jama.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=1555137

But the headlines may be somewhat misleading.

http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/questions/ask-the-expert-does-being-overweight-really-decrease-mortality-no/

A recent JAMA study got major media attention when it claimed that grade 1 obesity (BMI 30-<35) was not associated with any greater mortality, than being normal weight (BMI 18.5-<25). The authors also concluded that people who are up to 30 pounds overweight appear to have a lower risk of death than those who are within the normal BMI range for healthy weight. Many news articles or segments claimed that the study should come as a relief to those constantly struggling to lose weight because their extra pounds could actually be helping their health! Other sources have suggested that we need to re-organize our BMI ranges to reflect the study’s results, moving grade 1 obesity into a normal or healthy range. But our expert, HSPH’s Nutrition Department Chair, Dr. Walter Willett, explained that the study’s results are flawed and extremely misleading. In the following questions and responses, partially published by USAToday, Willett details the study’s weaknesses and provides advice to those who are overweight and possibly confused by these new findings. Read more about maintaining a healthy weight, what the BMI means, and explore ways to prevent obesity.

Q: Why do you think the research indicates that people who are overweight may actually have a lower risk of premature death?

A: The most serious problem in the Flegal paper is that their normal weight group included a mix of lean and active people, heavy smokers, patients with cancer or other conditions that cause weight loss, and frail elderly people who had lost weight due to rapidly declining health. Because the overweight and obese groups were compared to this mix of healthy and ill persons who have a very high risk of death, this led to the false conclusions that being overweight is beneficial, and that grade 1 obesity carries no extra risk. Also, because the Flegal study did not use the original data from the published papers, they could not look separately at different age groups, and we know that the relation between body weight and mortality is much stronger before age 65 than at older ages.

Q: Do you think the new statistics are accurate? If not, why?

A: The new statistics are completely misleading for anyone interested in knowing about their optimal weight. As discussed above, the fundamental reason is that the authors did not adequately separate people who are lean because they are ill from those who lean because they are active and healthy. This will inevitably lead to wrong conclusions about the effects of body weight on risk of premature death. Stated politely, the paper is a pile of rubbish.

And this is why I never put too much faith in "retrospective" studies.

jenilla1

The problem is that the study lumped people who had cancer and other terminal wasting diseases in, counting them as though they were naturally thin people, thereby skewing the results, making it look like thinness = early death.

thrld

Agree with poster above -- this is a flawed study. Just as BMI does not reflect the level of activity, % of body fat or type of diet -- a low BMI also does not ensure activity/exercise/healthy diet. Serena Williams is in one group, Karen Carpenter is in the other.

RoadsterGirlie

I think it's rubbish....how many old overweight people do you see?

My mom and I were just having this conversation today. The majority of the people who I see that are over-fat are folks under usually under 50 years of age. The older generation typically knows what a healthy diet is, and has more common sense when it come to eating. They were not raised on super-sized cokes and french fries.

My great-aunt who at 86 years old has never been overweight in her life, swears that cidar vinegar has kept her thin all these years. I personally think that's BS - she eats healthy and gets in lots of fruits and veggies because that's how she was raised.

My grandmother (her sister) has the same eating habits she does, and at 90 years old is still kicking strong. She goes hiking, swimming, and even horse back riding. That's what I'm aiming for.

bcattoes

I think it's rubbish....how many old overweight people do you see?

I guess it depends on what you call "old" I have quite a few relatives in their 70's and 80's that are obese.

lacharp

I agree with this concept totally - I am someone who will always have a high BMI but would actually be unhealthier at a normal BMI. After a lifelong struggle with my weight, I finally started seeing a specialist, who determined that I have a naturally dense frame, and that my lean body mass is 124lbs. Thing is, I'm 5'4". So the range I need to be in to have a healthy, and not too low, percentage of body fat, is actually higher than the "normal" range for BMI... so per the BMI I'll always be "overweight", but it would be less healthy for me to be in the "normal" range.

omma_to_3

I think it's rubbish....how many old overweight people do you see?

I guess it depends on what you call "old" I have quite a few relatives in their 70's and 80's that are obese.

Most of them in my family (are obese). All of them have made it into their 80s or 90s so far - except the one that was never overweight. He died young (in his 60s)

jrmartinezb

"I found it a very interesting read. I think it confirms that BMI does not by itself give an appropriate measure of a person’s health."

This is news?????

Of course it’s not news, but sadly a lot of people treat BMI as if it were a single reliable indicator of health. Insurance companies charge higher premiums, companies refuse to hire and doctors even prescribe treatment based solely on it. I say it’s great that scientists are doing this kind of research.

BMI says NOTHING OF FAT.

I SMH at how ignorant this whole discussion is (the article).

Our knowledge of what is healthy and not evolves continuously. A few years ago it was thought it was only weight, we now know it is body fat, and specially abdominal fat that is the problem. The way I see it the discussion is part of our getting a more sophisticated knowledge of how the body works.

jrmartinezb

Another excuse study to rationalize being fat.
And I'd gladly sacrifice a few years of life in exchange for quality of life - not that I am buying this.
If you want to be fat, just be fat.
No need to make it a health virtue.

I don’t think the study is trying to make being fat a health virtue. The problem with treating weight (or bmi) as a snapshot of a person’s health is not only that it <edit>sometimes</edit> points to problems when there are none, like in very muscular people, but that it can also hide actual risks (like in underweight persons or thin people with high body fat). I am definitely not saying that overweight=healthy, just that the issue is more nuanced than more weight --> less health.

That said, I also think that there are many reasonable objections that can be (and have been) made to the study. That is the beauty of peer review. Scrutiny of your work by others is what makes science thrive. I hope that more and better research gets done.

liittlesparrow

It just sounds like another reason for fat people to punk out, saying "being big is actually HEALTHY, SO THERE". But really, do what ever you want, either way, you will eventually die. Either being fat, skinny, muscled or thin.

Cheval13

the human mortality rate is actually 100%

No, it is not. A specific time frame is need to calculate mortality rate. While there may come a day when 100% of the human population dies, that day has not yet come.

Um... yeah. No

correlation doe not equal causation

^this