Wed, Nov-07-07, 15:30
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Senior Member
Posts: 197
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Plan: Just no carbs
Stats: 149.6/149.4/128
BF:
Progress: 1%
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Report: Extra weight doesn't increase cancer risk
I just saw this: http://www.newsday.com/news/health/...0,7602040.story
Quote:
Being overweight boosts the risk of dying from diabetes and kidney disease but not cancer or heart disease, and carrying some extra pounds appears actually to protect against a host of other causes of death, federal researchers reported Tuesday.
The counter-intuitive findings, based on analysis of decades of government data about more than 39,000 Americans, suggest that being overweight does carry risks, but the dangers may be less dire than experts thought.
"It's not a cookie-cutter, one-size-fits-all situation where excess weight just increases your mortality risk for any and all causes of death," said Katherine Flegal, a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention researcher who led the study.
The study was greeted with mixed reactions. Some praised it for providing persuasive evidence that the dangers of fat have been overblown. Others dismissed the findings, saying an overwhelming body of evidence has documented the risks of being overweight or obese.
The proportion of flabby Americans has been rising steadily. Two-thirds are now classified as overweight, including about one-third who have put on so many pounds they are obese. The trend has triggered warnings of impending epidemics of diabetes, heart, disease, cancer and other ailments.
Flegal and her colleagues raised the possibility two years ago that being overweight was less risky than feared. Their analysis of decades of federal surveys concluded that people who were overweight -- but not obese -- had lower overall mortality rates than those of normal weight. But their study came under heavy criticism.
In the new research, the team sought to confirm and expand on the original findings, examining additional data from later surveys and parsing individual causes of death across a range of weights.
The researchers calculated that in 2004, obesity was associated with as many as 112,000 excess deaths from heart disease and more than 45,000 from diabetes and kidney disease. Obesity was not, however, associated with an overall excess in cancer deaths, though it was linked to as many as 19,000 excess deaths from malignancies commonly blamed on fat, including breast, uterine, ovarian, kidney, colon and pancreatic cancer.
The most surprising finding was that being overweight but not obese was not associated with cancer or heart disease. Moreover, the researchers found an apparent protective effect against all other causes of death, such as tuberculosis, pneumonia, Alzheimer's and injuries.
Although the study did not examine why being overweight might guard against dying from some diseases, Flegal said other research has suggested that extra heft might supply the body with reserves to draw upon to fight illness.
"You may not just have more fat. You may also have more lean mass -- more bone and muscle," Flegal said. "If you are in an adverse situation, that could be good for you."
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This headline is the opposite of what the BBC just said: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/7069914.stm
These are different studies (at least, as far as I can tell). The one reported by the BBC apparently was a meta-analysis. The CDC looked at patient records collected over a period of time. Neither was experimental, per se, so far as I can tell -- that is, neither set up a treatment vs control group, varied by the degree of overweight and tracked cancer rates. An experiment like that would be very expensive, so don't look for any in the near future (so I also gather).
Still, no wonder people are confused.
Beth
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