YOUR
HEALTH
BMI - and
the truth shall set you free
Maclean’s
Magazine, May 5,
2014, pp. 16-17, has an interview with Dr. Carl Lavie who in his new book, The
Obesity Paradox, challenges the BMI and its use to determine ‘healthy
weight’.
His book is
based on a meta-analysis involving 2.9 million people and 270,000 deaths.
The results:
Anyone who has an overweight BMI reading of 25-30 has a 6% better chance of
reaching old age than someone fit and trim, with a ‘normal’ BMI of 19 - 25. And even those who by BMI standards are
slightly obese – at BMI of 30-35 -- still have a 5% longer life
expectancy than those ‘fit and healthy’ by BMI numbers.
This data
confirms what I have long said on this blog: based on insurance company
actuarial statistics that go back 40 years or more, people who are
somewhat overweight tend to live longer.
The ideal extra weight cited in the 1970s was around 10%.
Again, Dr.
Lavie confirms what insurers have long known.
When serious illness, surgery or medical treatment cause rapid weight
loss, having ‘a few extra pounds’ allows a cushion so the body
does not eat away at its own muscles: arm and leg and all internal organs –
to stay alive. There is a tipping point at which such damage becomes terminal
(i.e., you die) or results in long term muscle atrophy and other damage at the
cellular level.
Dr. Lavie
lists heart disease, arthritis, kidney disease, diabetes, cancer and HIV
(p. 16 – middle column) as causing dangerous weight loss; and one should add
the medical treatments of chemotherapy, radiation, liposuction and any
medication that causes nausea and reduced appetite.
Put simply,
having some extra fat on hips and bum (unlike the bad fat around the organs and
belly that reduces organ function) keeps the body’s survival mode from becoming
self-destructive.
Only severely
obese people, with ballistic BMI numbers above 40 have significantly worse longevity rates
than so-called ‘ideal’ BMI figures.
And only just
under 3% of American fit this category.
So much for
the obesity ‘epidemic’ that has been supposedly sweeping North America, and is
being propagandized through our media, governments and schools for the last few
decades.
Exercise ???
Dr. Lavie
also recommends moderate exercise for everyone and, for the first time as I can
recall, someone recommends avoiding marathon running.
He points
out that blood work and heart imaging immediately after a marathon show the same stresses as during a heart attack: namely,
heart dilation and “release of substances correlated with heart attacks and
heart failure.”
Regular such
racing – in practice or in competition - is, in his view, certain to cause, if
not sudden heart attack, long term damage to the circulatory system.
There is no
doubt in his mind that “there’s some acute damage to the heart with extreme
exercise”.
So stick to
brisk walking, swimming, bicycling, short run jogging if you must (as it caused
shin and lower joint damage) and pace yourself when playing sports.
Put simply,
while our culture has made athletes and the 6-pack lean-and-mean body or bikini-fit
the ideal – for males and females – it is
not a long term ‘healthy body’ and is the enemy of longevity.
Try this test:
Check how old your heroes were when they died – if they stayed trim all their lives.
NOTE: For wrestler
with shortened life spans see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Skudrafan1/List_of_professional_wrestlers_who_died_young and http://prowrestling.about.com/od/whatsrealwhatsfake/a/wrestlersdeaths.htm.
PS: The
marathon is named after the run by the Greek soldier Pheidippides who rushed
to Athens with the good news that the Persians had been defeated at Marathon, some
26 miles and 385 yards away -- after which he collapsed and died.
