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  A little overweight may be a good thing

Being a little over normal weight – that is, being overweight in the Body Mass Index model (having a BMI of between 25 and 30) - may actually be a good thing.

 

A group of US federal government researchers (from the Center for Disease Studies and Prevention, and National Cancer Association) has done interesting work in determining which diseases give rise to the highest death rates across the classic  weight groups (underweight, normal, overweight, obese) in the BMI group.

 

Among the things they found:

 

Overweight people have a lower overall death rate because they are less likely to die from a mix of diseases including Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, infections and lung disease.  In fact, in 2004, there were 100,000 fewer deaths in the US than would have been expected in this group were they of normal weight.

 

Moreover, this implied lower risk isn’t counterbalanced in their study by increased levels of disease that one might expect, such as heart disease, diabetes and cancer.  Their research also confirmed that those who are obese or underweight have higher disease rates than the normal class, for varying and complex reasons for each category.

 

It’s been suggested that the term overweight is actually a misnomer.  Perhaps, if we’re in the 25-30 BMI zone, we’re in the ideal zone instead.

 

There are some cautions, however, and there’s much more to learn.   For example, despite there being an overall lower death rate for overweight people, there are many studies which show how weight increases heart disease and cancer risk, and quite a lot of causal evidence.  And with obese people, this trend is clear – heart disease is clearly the biggest killer.  (Yet, interestingly, they have surprisingly low rates of cancer)  And finally, this study does no cause-and-effect work.  They don’t know, for instance, how being underweight increases the death rate from everything except heart disease and cancer.

 

But, as one of the researchers suggests, if you’re feeling well, get plenty of exercise and your doctor’s happy with your major test results, perhaps there isn’t much to worry about in being a little on the porky side.

 

(Study published in Journal of The American Medical Association, 7 Nov 2007)