Meaning: some of the hysteria about the so-called "epidemic" of obesity in America needs to be dialed down. So writes the irreplaceable Jacob Sullum today, an expert on many of these health/culture issues. He notes, for example: "At 5 feet, 9 inches tall and 175 pounds, I have a body mass index of 25.9, which makes me “overweight.” If I lost seven pounds, I'd have a BMI of 24.9, indicating what the government considers a “normal,” “healthy” weight.
Yet, that weight is not normal since two-thirds of American adults exceed it. And judging from the latest research, it is not necessarily healthy, either. According to a study recently published by the Journal of the American Medical Association, people in the government-recommended BMI range of 18.5 to 24.9 are more likely to die from a variety of diseases than people with BMIs of 25 to 30."
Other researchers confirm this: "Looking at data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, Miss Flegal and her colleagues found that people who qualified as “obese” (with BMIs of 30 or more) did indeed have a higher mortality rate than people in the “normal” range, as did those considered “underweight.” But people who were merely “overweight” had the lowest mortality rate of all."
Whoops! So what does this mean? "Although being merely “overweight” was associated with a higher death rate from diabetes and kidney disease, it “was not associated with mortality from cancer or cardiovascular disease.” And since overweight people were significantly less likely to die from other causes, “the net result was that overweight was associated with significantly decreased all-cause mortality.”...Standing alone, these data do not prove that plumpness is healthy or that thinness kills. But they do cast doubt on some of the more alarmist predictions made by “obesity epidemic” doomsayers."
