Does BMI Really Matter?

Should we be paying more attention to BMI? *

“According to the Kaiser BMI chart, I’m obese,” said a friend who does not visually appear to be anywhere close to obese. It was the sort of conversation that made me doubt the value of the body mass index (BMI) chart. Obese? Really? It was the sort of thing that made me question the validity of BMI. Does BMI really matter?

Past studies had suggested that perhaps overweight people had lower mortality rates than their thin counterparts. This finding was controversial, however, and the Harvard School of Public Health released a statement saying that, “there are serious flaws in the government researchers’ work. In fact, this study is hardly the final word on the relationship between weight and health-and it appears to have grossly underestimated the link between being overweight and mortality risk.

In December, I read this post from NPR and started wondering if maybe we should all be giving more thought to body mass index. According to a new study of nearly 1.5 million Caucasian adults, every 5-point increase in BMI leads to a 31% increase of risk of death from all causes. 31 percent. That’s huge.

I have to admit that I’m a little bit blown away by this number. What do you think?

* Photo from D.L. at 360112654_9bca0e1e78.jpg. Used under Creative Commons.

Tags: BMI, Health, mortality, risk factors, weight