Quote:
Originally Posted by chemgear
While I can understand that BMI isn't a perfect measurement, I am a little puzzled why it seems like the massive growth in overweight/obesity is often waved away in the name of making feel better about themselves. Don't get me wrong, I'm not interesting in bullying to get people to change. But it seems like people (in general) like to ignore the problem or blame it on genetics or how talking about how bad the issue is an assault on people's feelings.
Having just been in on a trip to Asia and back home, it is STAGGERING how large Canadians/North Americans are.
I'm a numbers guy so for the sake of comparison:
- more than 2/3 of all people are overweight or outright obese, nearly 70%
- roughly 1-2% of people suffered bulimia
- roughly 1-4% of people suffered anorexia
http://www.anad.org/get-information/...rs-statistics/
http://www.disordered-eating.co.uk/e...istics-us.html
Don't get me wrong, bulimia and anorexia are not good things (terrible actually) but they are not even in the same ballpark as a societal problem and cost. |
You've hit the nail though: the BMI is garbage as a health measure because it supposedly suggests that there is something wrong with being overweight (half that 2/3 are "overweight" - a demographic that lives longer and healthier than supposedly "normal" people), and a significant proportion of the less than 1/3 of the Canadian population that isn't "overweight" or lower on the BMI scale - i.e. the population that the BMI classifies as "obese" - aren't at greater risk of premature death than people the BMI classifies as "normal."
So, when you say 70% of the population is overweight or obese, it suggests that the vast majority of the Canadian population is unhealthy. In fact, only about 10% of the population (likely less) falls into a weight bracket with significantly increased likelihood of premature death - a figure far less significant than what is commonly promoted, i.e., 2/3 of the Canadian population.
And there's a huge industry out there pumping up the 2/3 figure for financial gain, and going out of their way to make people feel bad about not falling into a weight bracket that is, statistically, not the healthiest one to be in.
It's actually quite interesting when you get into this stuff, particularly the force of marketing and misinformation promoted in the supposed "health" industry.