obesity Archives - Argyll Free Press

Obesity Can Shorten Your Life by Up to Three years

July 15, 2016 By Karen Jackson Leave a Comment

A comprehensive study found that being overweight can shorten you life span by one year, while obesity can cost you up to three years of your life. Researchers found that people in the normal BMI range had the lowest risk of dying prematurely.

However, the study found that the death rates also increased for those below the “normal” range and the mildly overweight.

According to the recent research, the risk of dying from all causes rose as the body mass index went up. For instance, those mildly overweight or with a BMI reading between 25.0 and 27.5 risk losing 1.07 years of their lives.

Those mildly obese (BMI: 30 to 35) risk losing 1.45 years of their life spans; the severely obese with a BMI higher than 35 risk losing nearly 2 years, while the morbidly obese (BMI above 40) could see their life span shrink by 2.76 years.

Study authors noted that their meta-analysis which included observations on people worldwide challenges previous believes that being overweight or mildly obese does not impact life span. The findings also challenge the so-called “obesity paradox” which suggests that more body fat has a protective effect on metabolism in healthy people.

Researchers deemed the paradox purely speculative and hypothetical.

Still the risk of premature death dropped suddenly in overweight and obese people aged 70 or older. According to researchers, the risk of early death was more prominent in younger population, i.e. those in the 35-49 age range, than in the older one, i.e. those in the 70-89 range.

Researchers also found that overweight and obese men had a higher risk of premature death than their female counterparts.

Scientists that reviewed the research paper, however, said that study should be taken with a pinch of salt. They noted that it is yet unclear whether we should apply the newly found link between unhealthy BMI and early death to the general population.

NIH researcher David Berrigan and two fellow researchers who were not involved in the study wrote in an accompanying paper that more research needs to be done. They also noted that the findings cannot be generalized as smoking habits and other risk factors for early death were not taken into account in the meta-analysis.

The latest analysis was based on more than 200 studies, which were conducted after 1970, from 32 countries. The study also revealed that the risk of premature death was higher in the underweight and severely obese in Europe than in Asia.

Study results were published July 13 in the journal Lancet.

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Study Links A Sweet Tooth in Toddlers with Obesity

April 19, 2016 By Deborah Campbell Leave a Comment

Is there a difference between toddlers who prefer sweet or savory snacks? According to a new study, there is. Those who prefer cookies over chips are at risk of experiencing weight gain, possibly even growing to an unhealthy weight.

For the study, researchers asked mothers of 209 children to have the toddler fast for one hour. Then, the child would be given a large lunch and after, a tray of snacks both sweet and salty. The children could eat as much as they wanted.

According to Julie C. Lumeng, a behavioral pediatrician and the University of Michigan’s C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital and a researcher in the study, “eating in the absence of hunger is associated with being overweight among older children.”

However, this is the first study that studies the link between overeating and younger children. Toddlers who preferred sweet foods after already eating a substantial meal were found to be at a greater risk of weight gain.

Researchers discovered that the children between 1 and 3 years of age who ate more desserts on a full belly and who became visibly upset when the food was removed, were also the children to experience gradual gain in body fat by the time they were 33 months old.

The team was surprised by these findings, seeing that those who preferred chips and other salty treats did not experience the same increase in body fat.

Lumeng explained that the tendency to eat even when you’re no longer hungry only becomes more of a problem with age, sometimes leading to lifelong complications regarding weight gain.

According to this study, medical researchers need to find ways to suppress this drive to eat before children turn 3 years old.

The findings are also relevant to parents because it helps them regulate food intake for healthy growth in their toddlers.

It’s easier to prevent a lifelong struggle with being overweight by making sure the child avoids the concerning treats than letting the child deal with it when he or she grows up.

Moreover, the study published in the journal Pediatrics, April edition, also shows that there’s a previously unknown connection between sweet treats and obesity, a drive to eat more that researchers should investigate further.

The team hopes to find whether or not there are ways to treat this particular compulsion, which could mean conducting a follow-up study.
Image Source: CTV News

More Obese Than Underweight People Worldwide, Study

April 1, 2016 By Cristopher Hall Leave a Comment

According to a major study conducted by the Imperial College London, the number of obese adults in the world has surpassed the number of those who are underweight.

Starting from 1975 and ending in 2014, the team of scientists looked at and compared body mass index (BMI) among nearly 20 million adult men and women. The results were featured in a recent issue of The Lancet.

What lead author Prof Majid Ezzat calls “an epidemic of severe obesity” is, in fact, the modern day plague causing the population to become increasingly more obese. This health-damaging disease has tripled in men and more than doubled in women, according to the results.

For the study, scientists pooled data from 186 countries, revealing that the number of obese people across the world had spiked from “105 million in 1975 to 641 million in 2014.”

Meanwhile, the number of underweight people had also gone up from “330 million to 462 million” over the same period. In other words, the study’s conclusion is that in 2014, there were 266 million obese men and 375 million obese women worldwide.

This research also shows that there are almost “zero chances” for us to reach the World Health Organization’s global obesity target for 2025; the WHO wants no rise in obesity above 2010 levels.

According to its clinical definition, obesity is represented by an increased BMI – which measures weight in relation to height – of 30 kilograms per meter squared (kg/m2).

While the results of this study might seem good news for the number of underweight individuals, there has been a critical shift in our world over the last 40 years.

Underweight prevalence has been surpassed by obesity, which has prompted Prof Ezzat to call the governments to action and start implementing policies to address obesity.

There isn’t just one solution to the obesity epidemic, but Prof Ezzat believes that making healthy food more affordable while increasing the price of unhealthy processed foods could be one of the answers.

In the meantime, Prof George Davey Smith from the School of Social and Community Medicine at the University of Bristol believes there can also be an unhealthy focus on the problem of obesity in detriment of “the substantial remaining burden of under-nutrition.”

This could divert significant resources away from disorders that affect the poor and the underweight to those that are statistically more likely to affect the wealthier.

The truth is that while the causes of obesity are complex, we live in a world which encourages low levels of physical activity and poor diets.
Image Source: Think Progress

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