Everybody thinks that Body Mass Index, or BMI as it’s more commonly known, is an accurate way to work out if someone is healthy.
Alas, it’s not.
Invented by a mathematician who said himself that because he wasn’t a scientist that it shouldn’t be used to indicate overall health, the BMI formula is a simple height versus weight ratio but doesn’t take on board the composition of the body. For example, a 190cm man who lifts weights at the gym each day may weigh in at 16 stone, however, a man of the same height and weight may spend his days sat on the sofa, eating chocolate. Their BMI would work out the same, but their body would be made up completely differently. At the peak of his bodybuilding career, Arnold Schwarzenegger had a BMI of 33, putting him way into the obese bracket and I don’t think I’d like to be the one to have to tell him that he should be losing weight!
I’ve put together some myth-busting facts behind BMIs to put your mind at ease if yours is slightly higher than it should be...
A low BMI ensures that you’re healthy.
BMI measures your weight in comparison to your height. It can’t measure more in depth things such as your blood pressure, blood sugar levels, cholesterol and insulin levels. Although being overweight is associated with illnesses like diabetes, heart diseases and Alzheimer’s there isn’t necessarily any proof behind it- thin people are just as much at risk as larger people.
A study was carried out on 4046 pairs of identical twins over a period of 12 years to investigate the link between BMIs and health problems. During those 12 years, there was 203 heart attacks and 550 deaths among twins with lower BMIs and for the twins with higher BMIs there was 209 heart attacks and 663 deaths.
You’re healthy if your BMI is between 19 and 25.
With less than 19 indicating you’re underweight and over 25 meaning you’re obese, they say that 19 – 25 is a happy medium and you’re the ideal weight… But don’t be fooled, these numbers should be taken fairly lightly. The BMI guidelines were changed in 1998 to bring the overweight bracket down from 27.8 to 25.
‘Surely this is because of scientific facts’, I hear you cry!
Surprisingly, this wasn’t the case. The committee researching the change had seen that evidence pointed to the fact that the category brackets should be raised, not lowered but the Government weren’t in agreeance; they’d been recommended that the guidelines needed to align with global standards. The global standards which had been set by two pharmaceutical companies who were the only two companies at the time making weight loss tablets. They were making these recommendations knowing that people would be rushing out, desperate to lose weight and therefore thinking of their bank balances rather than the health of the public.
Eating healthily and exercising regularly will always lower your BMI.
Muscle weighs more than fat so even though you may spend time and effort consciously losing weight, your weight may go up and therefore lead to your BMI going up also. In exercising and watching what you eat, you’ll be losing fat, gaining muscle and making all round positive changes to your body - none of which the BMI calculator would pick up on.
So don’t worry too much about what your BMI is. Be your own judge. Look in a mirror, check if your jeans are getting too tight and talk to your Doctor. Don’t let your BMI be a measure of success on your weight loss journey; remember that healthy people come in different sizes, you don’t need to be stick thin to be healthy.
