A little extra weight may protect from early death

Published on June 24th, 2009

CTV.ca | A little extra weight may protect from early death — How this jives with starvation theory of longevity remains to be seen. But sounds like a good excuse to eat more!

The data revealed that underweight people and those who are extremely obese die earlier than people of normal weight — a finding that surprised no one. But researchers were surprised to see that carrying a little extra weight may give people a longevity advantage. They found that those with a BMI between 25 and 30 had a significantly decreased risk of death in the 12-year follow-up period of the study.

Underweight people were 70 per cent more likely than people of normal weight to die, and extremely obese people were 36 per cent more likely to die. But overweight individuals were 17 per cent less likely to die.

The study authors note that many of the deaths occurred among the elderly — a population for whom a little extra weight may be healthy.

13 users responded in " A little extra weight may protect from early death "

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# 1 Dale said, on June 24th, 2009 at 8:25 pm

Makes sense to me.. Pass the taters.

# 2 Speter said, on June 24th, 2009 at 9:01 pm

if you are old and cold, having extra fat will prevent you from freezing to death

if you are old and fat you will not be able to out-run death when he comes knocking.

I wonder if the study took into account general health and fitness, as these are crucial to include with the weight to make an accurate statistic,

ie: being fat and fit is better than thin and unfit, being thin and healthy is better than being normal weight but have some massive underlying disease.

and were they smart people, because people who are followers of moranism will find it leads to early death through stupidity

# 3 Hmeyers said, on June 24th, 2009 at 9:29 pm

But not these people abusing their skeletons with 100 extra pounds.

And then they get in the way with their Scootercarts at the grocery store because they can’t walk.

And for some reason we reward these people for abusing themselves with front parking spaces.

# 4 Ah_Yea said, on June 24th, 2009 at 9:48 pm

I THINK I SEE A TWINKIE!!!

# 5 Troublemaker said, on June 24th, 2009 at 10:04 pm

Makes sense… if you are elderly and become sick with the flu or pneumonia, you have a little extra fat to live off of if you can’t take in solid nourishment.

# 6 noname said, on June 24th, 2009 at 10:06 pm

There are several glaring operative words and phrases like

“A little extra”

“may protect”

Too many dumb Americans are inclined to take the word “may” and bet their lives that it means “will”.

Also, I don’t think “A little extra weight” implies any heath benefits for the many morbidly obese people.

I think people should read this for what it is, an educated guess. Americans, wake up and use some common sense.

# 7 Eric said, on June 25th, 2009 at 3:02 am

Maybe because the slightly overweight aren’t distraught over being too fat.

Relax, you’ll live longer.

# 8 John McNeally said, on June 25th, 2009 at 4:07 am

One more study brought to you by: McDonald’s

# 9 Jägermeister said, on June 25th, 2009 at 4:57 am

This guy will live forever…

# 10 dusanmal said, on June 25th, 2009 at 6:32 am

No one in press takes another look at this study and compares it with other similar ones.
1) This study focused at the condition of the person at the time of death. Which may or may not have anything to do with their lifetime behavior. Being thin at the deathbed is consequence of many diseases.
2) Many other longevity studies focused on the lifetime of being under/on/over – weight. Every single one of those came on the side of under-nourished, big time. To such extent, both in humans and test animals that few researchers themselves followed their finding with extreme low calories diets. (And yes, when they die they will contribute to a number of people who died thin, be it in their 100’s).

# 11 David said, on June 25th, 2009 at 6:44 am

Statistics have a funny way of obscuring the truth.

For example, let’s say that 90 percent of old people are fat, 8 percent are thin because they’re sick with something that’s wasting them away, and 2 percent are thin because they eat healthy.

The first group (overweight) lives on average to 72 years.
The second group (sick and thin) lives on average to 67 years.
The third group (healthy and then) lives on average to 87 years.

Even though the healthy thin people live on average 12 years longer than the overweight people, they are grouped in with the thin sick people. The result is that the statistic says that the overweight people live longer than thin people.

This type of problem unfortunately is common in biostatistics.

# 12 Rick's Cafe said, on June 25th, 2009 at 8:48 am

We need a definitive answer here and in the ‘new’ American-way, the 1st step is a lawsuit against the evil life insurance company for overcharging premiums on all those (used to be) overweight (now classified as healthy) people.

The outcome will be determined in the Supreme Court, with Insurance companies loosing – Public opinion saying, ‘it’s unfair to pick on fat people!

Result is this being the only case that a wise Latina woman (slightly overweight) may actually make a better* decision than a skinny, white male

*defined as: Better for me, not necessarily anyone else.

# 13 deowll said, on June 25th, 2009 at 2:07 pm

No mystery. Low body weight slows metabolism which slows aging but it also means that you have no energy reserves if you have a serious illness or injury.

Everybody knows about being fat.

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