Millions more middle-aged are obese, study suggests

[nitpicked]

https://www.bbc.com/news/health-69009787

Millions more middle-aged are obese, study suggests
7 hours ago
By Philippa Roxby,

Millions of middle-aged people have been mistakenly led to believe they are not obese, according to an Italian study that looked at body fat instead of weight related to height.
(snip)

A study of 4,800 adults aged 40-80 years old, led by the University of Tor Vergata in Rome, and presented at the European Congress on Obesity, looked at an alternative - measuring body fat percentage.

Just 38% of the men and 41% of the women had a BMI above 30 - but when their body fat percentage was calculated using scans, 71% and 64% were found to be obese.
(snip)

A BMI of 27 should be used to define obesity in future, the researchers said.
(snip)

[IrishAfricanAmerican]

1. BMI is not an accurate metric for everyone.

[madaboutharry]

2. Americans in particular have terrible eating habits

and they have exported that to the rest of the world.
I don’t know the science behind BMI, I just know people eat too much unhealthy food.

[jimfields33]

6. BMI is not the right tool to use.

They need to go back to the drawing board. Americans definitely don’t eat well. You can see it at the grocery stores. This study was worldwide which is horrible because European countries used to be the standard bearer of healthy living. That’s seems to not be the case any longer.

[Aussie105]

3. Yes, the American diet and lack of exercise

will do that to everybody as they age.

(Looking in the mirror at myself proves the point.)

Seems to me that people eat more than they need to try to keep their energy levels up as it was in younger years as they age.
Doesn't work.
Your muscles get less, the fat gets more.
Your weight might remain stable, but it's happening.

(Looking in the mirror at myself proves the point. Must stop doing this. lol)

Truth is, short people who have been skinny all their lives live longer and have fewer health problems in their 90's.
Go look at your local nursing home for proof.

[Croney]

4. About short people in nursing homes...

They might not have always been short. I was once 5'7", and at 79-1/2 I am barely 5'5". When I'm 90 I'll need a footstool to brush my teeth. 🙂

[lark]

10. This happened to me too!

I have had the exact height loss as you and I'm only 72. I know mine is from blown out discs, is that your issue too?

[Croney]

11. Just compressed, I guess. I have no back pain at all, so I'm lucky.

[jimfields33]

7. Problem in the 90's is Alzheimer's and that doesn't discriminate on size.

[gab13by13]

5. Going to the doctor today today

For a regular checkup, so I just weighed myself, 173, 6 feet tall, 76 years old. I don’t want to go over 173, want my range 170-173.
Daughter fed me pasta last night.

[AnnaLee]

8. If it is true that fat cells never go away

So, supposedly, fat cells shrink when weight is lost but they never go away. If so, when fat is measured, do empty fat cells still affect the result?

I am one of those old people who has gone from 5'7 to 5'5. I also am a fat person from birth. So, my weight has fluctuated from over 200 to under 120 lbs several times in my life. I currently am in a skinny cycle at 115 lbs. Two years ago, I was 240 lb. As I tell people, it is lost for now, but I am sure I will find it somewhere.

And yea, I have all the baggage - the low thyroid, the diabetes, heart bypass and stints, clogged arteries, and whatever. But I know many people I grew up with that have had similar lifestyles and diet, some lazier and eating more than me, that have never been obese.

I do wonder, however, perhaps personally, why we are so determined to label people and group them into the undesired "other". No matter what we claim we are doing when we only accomplish precisely this.

[james44]

9. excellent

very nice ideias, good