In the Lottery of Life, we all know that fat people die sooner, except they don't . . .

The healthiest weight might actually be 'overweight', massive study finds

. . . they live longer, healthier lives. 

The data don't lie. Eat or die, baby, eat or die.

"A study spanning almost four decades and involving more than 100,000 adults in Denmark has found that those with an ‘overweight' body mass index (or BMI) were more likely to live longer than those in the 'healthy', 'underweight', and 'obese' categories."

Big study, long time period, tight focus, and the winner is, the overweight! Thin will kill you, really! But boy did she look good in the casket!

Anyone who follows Maddog's rants will know that Maddog has reported this for a long time. There is a reason your body wants to pack on a few pounds, and it is not because it wants to die early. After global alarmism/environmentalism, medicine takes second place in the Cargo Cult division. Medical professionals are hidebound, and determined to be wrong about nearly every issue, and this is especially true about health and lifestyle issues. 

"They found that during the four decades of analysis - from 1976 to 2013 - the BMI associated with lowest risk of death increased from 23.7 to 27.

If your BMI is between 18.5 and 24.9, you're considered normal or 'healthy', and if your BMI is between 25 and 29.9, you’re considered 'overweight'. A BMI of 30 or more is classified as 'obese'." 

Maddog noticed this by the early 1990s back when his litigation practice began to shift to medical issues. It seemed clear that the overweight category even then was healthier and living longer than the normal weight. There was some issue about longevity between the normal weight category and the obese category, but this study resolves that as well. The underweight are frankly screwed, just do not go there.

"The study also found that those in the 'obese' category ended up having the same risk of death as those in the 'normal' range, even when factors such as age, sex, family history of disease, socio-economic status, and smoking were taken into account."

Oh, Snap! Fat guys have the same risk of death as "normal" weight people, even when normed for age, sex, family medical history, etcetera?!?! So, all those people whinging about Johnny losing weight, were simply sadists, looking at Johnny as a fun, and friendly piñata! "Hey, he's fat, smack him about because it's OK, fat shaming is cool."

"This means that in the past 40 years, the weight category associated with the longest lifespan has gone from 'normal' to squarely in the 'overweight' camp, which suggests that either our classification for 'normal' weight is wrong, or the link between our weight and our overall health is far more complicated than we thought."

Ya think! Over the years we decided that the only people who know less about their bodies than Maddogsmother-in-law are physicians, and medical researchers. So, why place any faith in this study? We only place the most rudimentary faith in this study, but this one makes far more sense than the belief that there is a "normal" weight and it is when humans are downright skinny. Why in the world would evolution/God (you choose, Maddog don't care) create us to build fat stores if they were deleterious to our health? Provided the individual remains active, and exercises in reasonable amounts, the fat is a protection for health, not an antagonist to health. But only a rarified few medical researchers ever let logic, reason, or a rational understanding of the world intrude on their research. No, they spend nearly all their time attempting to find ways of cleverly biasing the outcomes so it is really difficult to figure out that the data is valueless, but the outcome points to what they want. 

Why Most Published Research Findings Are False

You need to read the above study to get a flavor for just how bullshit the current research findings are. It will surely shock you, well, unless you have been reading Maddog's rants, then its old hat. 

Back to the story at hand.

"Quite simply, it looks like the body mass index is pretty much bullshit, and we should stop using it as a horribly generalized indication of what an individual 'should' weigh."

Agreed. Any index which labels Arnold Schwarzenegger, in his body building prime, obese is bonkers. So, yeah, it's bullshit. But it is easy, and lazy doctors love easy, and don't care much about bullshit.

"'In the overweight BMI category, 47 percent are perfectly healthy," said Jeffrey Hunger from the University of California, Santa Barbara, who was part of the findings from back in February."

OK, so if only 47% are perfectly healthy, but 100% live longer than the normal weight, why not give us some information on what is wrong with the normal weight? Instead you pile on with the healthy, but overweight? We want to know why the normal weight are unhealthy and live shorter lives than the overweight, and the same lifespans as the obese. 

Some 54 million 'overweight' or 'obese' Americans are actually healthy, say scientists

"A good example of how BMI can offer skewed results is when it is used to calculate the health of athletic individuals. While these people can be incredibly fit, under BMI their heavier muscle tone can mistakenly lead to them being classified as overweight or obese.

The discrepancy is at its most apparent when looking at the BMI of some famous (and clearly not unhealthy) athletes. For example, according to an analysis early last year, NFL player Tom Brady is obese, and Olympic athletes Usain Bolt and Michael Phelps just narrowly miss the 'overweight' camp."

Don't worry, Maddog has it on good authority that the federal government is on this!

"Also, a new rule proposed by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) could penalize people with BMIs higher than 25 – the upper limit of the 'healthy' range – by making them pay higher premiums."

As expected, they are on this like stink on shite. How is it that the US federal government can routinely and consistently get every medical, health, and longevity issue wrong? The food pyramid? Crap! Cholesterol is bad for you! Wrong. Low fat, high carbohydrate diets are best! Wrong. BMI is a great index and should be used to adjust insurance premiums! Wrong, you idiot pikers! 

Please cut the budget of all these federal government doers of damage to ZERO, today, right now, this minute!

God help those who are underweight! Just eat something, a pea, something.