Today’s big news (Well, it had first billing on the radio this morning) is that women in the UK are fatter than anywhere else in Europe. Men don’t escape criticism either, being second “fattest”.
Whilst I don’t doubt health is important, I’m always wary of the numbers like this. As I’m sure I’ve mentioned before, the British Army regards me as both healthy and fit enough to serve on the front line, and I can comfortably pass all the fitness tests required.
But my BMI, 26.1, says I’m “overweight”. 18-25 is regarded as a healthy range, depending on who you ask, but I suspect I’d look like an unhealthy stick insect with a BMI of 18 and I’m almost certain I would struggle with fitness.
I do wonder how much of the media focus on BMI is due to a Daily-Mailesque obsession not with fitness and health in general, but with looking like a supermodel.
I think there’s certainly something to do with that, but I think there’s also the problem of how the medical community loves quick and easy ways to pigeon-hole people.
A good friend of mine runs a fitness studio and is probably the most muscular man I know, fit as a fiddle and the sort that does triathlons galore yet he’s in trouble with his health insurance because the figures they get from his doctor say he’s obese (and therefore a higher risk).
About 8 years ago, I went diet and fitness crazy and dropped to a BMI of 20.5. You could see every one of my ribs and I looked gaunt and unhealthy and was told to put some weight on by my doctor.
Since then, I’ve taken BMI figures with a huge pinch of salt.
I took the Daily Mail with a shovel load of salt long before that! 🙂
According to my BMI I’m clinically obese. The fact that I can leg press 200 kilos quite happily might have something to do with it; a good fifth of that has to be my quads…
Does that mean we are all women again? 😉